On the Run
by Penguin's Flight
Summary: After being separated from Harry, Hermione finds herself on the run with none other than Lucius Malfoy.
1. On the Run

**Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoy :)**

 **I love getting (constructive) feedback, if you've got the time, please review or pm me. **I've fixed my rot/wrought iron mistake, if you see any other obvious mistakes, please let me know so I can fix them! Thank you so much to zeeksmom for pointing that one out!**

 **I'm about halfway done the story, but with finals coming up in a couple weeks, updates will definitely be sporadic.**

 _November 14, 1997_

His whole body felt the searing pain emanating from his arm. The brand, seeped in dark magic and whatever other horrible intent the man they called their Lord imbued it with, burned against his left forearm. It called him to his master's side, and closing his eyes in preparation for whatever he was about to experience or witness, he gave in to the call and apparated back to the manor.

It was his home for many years, but it had lost that title in recent times. The gates were familiar wrought iron, covered in magical vines, and the white peacocks which wandered the property were somehow still alive, despite the bodies buried in mass graves in the grounds he learned to play quidditch over. The place had been poisoned, his memories of it soured, and ever since the Dark Lord had taken Malfoy Manor over as headquarters, he was thankful that most of his time was spent at Hogwarts.

Draco was _almost_ relieved when others apparated near him. McNair, Yaxley, and Dolohov were amongst a group also trudging towards the front entrance, with various levels of reluctance and enthusiasm. There was a certain safety in numbers he couldn't deny, even if he found their presence repugnant. He would take anything to decrease the odds that he was the one called forward for some heinous task, or punished for a real or imaginary failure, as a blessing. What was waiting for them inside was anyone's guess.

Draco took his place next to his father, near the middle of the hoard, off to the side somewhere. Drawing as little attention to their family as possible, that seemed to be their goal, at least when his father wasn't pandering to regain favour.

The Dark Lord spoke of the ministry's fall, of the Potter boy's imminent capture, of the success rate of the Muggle-Born registration committee. So they were celebrating, Draco gathered, although there was very little difference between celebrations and whatever the opposite of them were. At the first, there were muggles and mudbloods tortured for sport, while at the later, it was the loved ones of whomever had most recently blundered. He was quite sure that the former sort of 'entertainment' served a double purpose, to appease death eater's like his aunt Bella, and to remind the others why they couldn't leave. This was what happened to the enemies of the cause.

He could hardly bring himself to look when a girl was being marched into the room, presumably under the imperius, by none other than Dolores Umbridge. The woman thought, for reasons that were entirely her own, that it would be appropriate to wear her ghastly pink robes, complete with the girlish bow sitting at the top of her head. Not, he acknowledged, that it really mattered how she was dressed in the scheme of things. The juxtaposition between her attempt at cheerful attire and what was going to begin unfolding in minutes merely highlighted once more the depravity of the meetings.

He looked at the girl more closely. For a horrifying moment, he thought it might be Mudblood Granger herself. Quickly, it became apparent she was not. Not that the outcome was any better. It was a Hufflepuff mudblood, a couple years younger than him. She was the quiet, studious type that liked to avoid conflict. He was sure he'd never even spoken a word to her in all the years they were at school together. It was a fact he was especially glad for tonight, because it would only have made it harder to stand by and watch unfold whatever it was the Dark Lord had planned for her.

It turned out, it didn't make it that much easier once his aunt and her husband got a hold of her. He could feel the bile rising in his throat, and to his horror, found he couldn't keep it down. His eyes teared up as his dinner threatened to expulse itself at his feet. He braced himself for the crucio that would be coming soon, but then his mind relaxed, opening itself to his father's will. _Stand up_ , he was ordered, and _stay calm_. The calm, euphoric feeling lasted several minutes before Lucius released him from the curse, incapable of holding him under it a moment longer without a wand. A new sense of horror filled him when Draco realized his father, _Lucius_ , had just used the imperius curse on him. He was quite certain he would have prefered a crucio, at least his mind would have remained his own.

Umbridge stood by, looking far too pleased with herself, watching the Dark Lord watching the show. If anything, it unsettled Draco's stomach further. His father stood by him, digging his fingers into his arm with enough strength to cause no small amount of pain, reminding him of where he was, and what the consequences could be if he forgot himself again. He didn't want to die, which was all he could seem to hold onto at the moment. As much as he hated his life, he just didn't want it to end completely. He wasn't ready for that.

It was a blessing for the girl when someone finally killed her, her screams no longer echoing through the hall, piercing through the silent mass of killers. For the most part, people seemed to breathe easier once it was over, although a few fanatics like Rabastan and McNair managed to exude the appropriate disappointment. Draco could feel himself about to be sick once again, and tried to keep it together, knowing the consequences if he failed would be dire. That thought alone did nothing to settle his stomach, and he was more thankful than he'd ever been when the Dark Lord dismissed them.

He quickly walked to the drawing room, followed by his father and his aunt, finally throwing up and giving in to sobs when the door was closed behind him. His breathing was ragged, and he could feel the onslaught of a panic attack, as though he wasn't already fucked enough.

His father gripped his arm once more, "Draco, pull yourself together." he said.

His tone was harsh, angry, frustrated - it drove Draco mad to hear it. He'd failed his father once again, but he didn't even sure he want to live up to his expectations anymore. How could he possibly stand there and watch what had just happened without flinching, keeping the same bored, stoic expression he wore plastered across his face he always did. A look of perfect indifference.

He used to admire his father's ability to keep his emotions in check, now it disgusted him. Did he even feel emotion, did he even recognize that the people being tortured were _people_? If they'd been alone, he might have began to express just fraction of his anger, but Bellatrix Lestrange began to rail at him.

"I have never been so ashamed to call you family. You disappointed our Lord when you failed to complete your mission, you disappointed our Lord when you abstained from the festivities last week, and you've disappointed him again today by this," she gestured to him, "blatant disrespect."

The woman seemed genuinely distraught at the notion, and it irked Lucius that she sounded like her sister did when someone failed to mention her new robes, or worse, made a passive aggressive comment about her blood-traitor sister. Draco stood up, fully aware that while the dangerous glint habitually in Bella's eyes was still hidden, the disrespect and disappointment stemmed from her obsession with the cause. He knew something was about to come of it when she pulled out her wand, pointing it at him with her arm shaking in anger.

"Crucio." she uttered, all semblance of sanity slipping from her countenance with the use of the curse. It didn't land on its intended, with Lucius stepping in front of his son and taking the curse instead.

By the time Bellatrix had her wand trained on Draco a second time, Narcissa walked into the room. "Enough, sister!"

"You didn't see the boy, Cissy. Crying over the loss of a mudblood," she hissed, although she lowered her wand, rounding on the smaller, blonde woman. "I suppose you bear some of the responsibility for raising such a weak child."

Bellatrix sneered towards Lucius, "Although I know where I place most of the blame." she was speaking to Lucius now, not watching the way her sister's face paled with every word she uttered, "If he steps one more toe out of line, I won't hesitate to take the Dark Lord's suggestion to _prune_ the family tree."

With that, the woman stormed out of the room, leaving the Malfoy family standing uncomfortably mulling over what Bellatrix had threatened.

Narcissa held her son's horrified gaze for a minute, aware that steps needed to be taken immediately. She'd allowed this farce to go on for far too long, allowed her son to be dragged in far too deep. There was no way out, but she would find one, there was no other choice.

* * *

 _November 20th, 1997_

He woke in cold sweat, barely refraining from screaming more times than he could acknowledge. The last time he'd gotten a full night's sleep was likely in his fifth year at Hogwarts, when the worst monster he had to contend with was the High Inquisitor, who admittedly, showed a particularly nasty streak as of late.

"Draco," a voice hissed, shaking him awake, pulling him away from yet another nightmare where he relived every last one of his worst memories.

Startled, the terrified, overly young Death Eater sat up, relaxing when he realized it was only his mother.

Narcissa felt her stomach drop at the sight of him, his platinum blonde hair and grey eyes, so clearly his father's. She wondered one more time if she could do this, if she could really leave Lucius behind, break their marriage bond and sever all ties with him. She could see the marked differences. Where Lucius's eyes were filled with cold indifference, her son's were filled with terror. Where her husband's hair always looked pristine, well...less so recently, considering his attempt to drown himself in firewhiskey, her son's was drenched in sweat from his nightmares.

He'd been her husband for nearly twenty years, even if theirs was far from a love match, she supposed that ought to earn him some amount of loyalty. He never hurt her, he was never a cruel husband, but she'd resigned herself to the knowledge that the Dark Lord would always take priority over his family. His master came first in all things, and although it was a cause she herself had once wholeheartedly supported, it meant she couldn't trust him. He would track her and Draco to the ends of the world if it meant proving his devotion. She shot another look towards the door, then stood up and paced, stiffening her resolve one last time. Draco was what mattered, her son was always her priority, the way he ought to have been Lucius's. She halted, spinning towards him.

"Get dressed." she said, "we're leaving."

Draco's eyes widened. He was too surprised to say anything, but obediently, changed while his mother guarded the door. They were leaving. They were _leaving_. There would be no more Death Eater meetings with ex professors murdered on the dining room table, no more muggles being raped and tortured by his fellow Death Eaters, no more mudbloods screaming and pleading for their lives. They would be free again. They might even be safe again.

Narcissa gestured for him to follow her, making her way towards the only unwarded floo entrance in the manor, in Voldemort's very own study. The corridors were deserted at this time, eerily similar to before the manor became Death Eater headquarters.

One could almost imagine it was welcomed guests sleeping in the rooms that lined them, rather than some of the worst monsters Europe had to offer. Fenrir, Antonin, Rabastan, Rodolphus, Walden, her own sister, Bella. These were people whose humanity had been stripped away, their sanity as far gone as some of the people they tortured. Whether it was Azkaban, or their Lord himself who'd hit them with the cruciatus too many time, she'd never know. All she knew, was that the end results were far from pleasant.

They shuffled along, taking care not to make too much noise.

"Where's Father?" Draco whispered, suddenly horrified.

Narcissa looked at her son, calculating what it was best to say. "There was never any marriage to salvage, and there's little of your father left. He'll sooner turn us over to the Dark Lord then let us leave, now _follow me_ , Draco."

"He'll be killed when they find out we left." Draco said, picturing his father stepping into Bellatrix's curse only a few days earlier. His father, who'd tried to protect him, even if Draco did have mixed feelings about him in recent days.

"Your father can take care of himself." Narcissa snapped, her voice quiet, but cutting. She was growing impatient. Her plan was very time sensitive, and she estimated they had little more than a five minute window if they wanted to make it out safely. The Dark Lord was in a _meeting_ with Bella, safely across the manor, but not for long. If he happened to return early, they would be dead on the spot. The longer they waited, the worse their odds. She'd already hesitated long enough.

"He doesn't even have a wand…" Draco said, swallowing hard.

"He chose this life, Draco. We didn't. We'll all be killed unless we go. Now."

Draco followed her, this time without the undercurrent of joy and relief. His father was going to die. They were going to leave, but his father was going to die as a result. Swallowing hard, he stepped into the office after she dismantled some of the nastier wards, not wanting to know how she'd gotten knowledge specific enough to do so.

He heard the alarms go off, but it was too late, him and his mother were already disappearing in a flash of green flames.

* * *

Lucius woke from a painful slumber, his entire body feeling the residual ache from his time in Azkaban and the injuries leading up to it. With the prison escape and subsequent implied house arrest, there had been no opportunity to see a healer. Liquor eased the pain.

He smelled the spilled firewhiskey, and felt immediately nauseous, reminding him of the reason behind the pounding headache he was experiencing. Drinking to ease the pain of his injuries often turned to drinking to ease his guilt. There was little left to do but pray each day to any listening deity that his family would see live through the end of the war.

Draco was safely tucked away at Hogwarts most of the year, but since he'd been home for an extended Christmas, under the Dark Lord's orders, it was all he could do not to fall apart. His own child was subjected to the same type of sick displays he'd been forced to watch growing up. He'd sworn to himself after the first fall of the Dark Lord that his son's childhood would be different than his, it would be happy. He would be able to sleep at night without the screams of countless nameless, faceless victims haunting him.

The Dark Lord was as enthusiastic as ever with muggle sport, but his Death Eaters no longer appeared to have the same stomach for it as they did in their younger days. He watched his peers attentively, relieved at the slow tide of waning support. It didn't matter to him very much whether they slowly disappeared of their own volition, or if they were killed off by their increasingly mad Master - as long as he and his son were part of the lucky few to survive and live to see the end of the second war. The permanent downfall of the Dark Lord.

Lucius groaned at the sound of the alarms reverberating through the manor. It meant something, his groggy mind told him. It was important, something seemed to scream at him.

Finally, when he heard footsteps rushing into the library he knew what had happened. His wife was distant as ever, but she appeared to have found a new purpose to her days for the past week. If he'd spent the days sober, he would have realized she was planning something. He knew now, almost instinctively, that she'd taken Draco away and was currently on the run. She'd done what he couldn't and protected their child, smuggled Draco away from the manor. She was always clever, Narcissa Malfoy, now Narcissa Black once more.

She'd left him there to die. The thought wasn't as bitter as it might have been, once, in the distant past. He removed his wedding ring, examining his unadorned hand. The pain that might have once shot through him at the action was conspicuously absent. He didn't have the time, but he contemplated what it meant anyways. She'd really done it. Severed their marriage bond. It was a practical choice, to be sure, removing the possibility of being tracked by their rings. She probably left the ring in the manor somewhere, regardless, if she was being particularly smart.

Death Eaters surrounded him in the library, wands drawn on him. He stood, leaning heavily on his cane.

"How the mighty have fallen, isn't that right, Malfoy?" McNair taunted. Disgusting man that he was, he didn't know when to keep his mouth shut.

Unarmed, it was foolish to even contemplate fighting his way past them. The Dark Lord would finish him off soon enough, although it would be drawn out and painful. An example of what happens to those who betray his bid to take over the magical world. It might even win the madman back some loyalty, if only temporarily.

Looking at the angry faces surrounding him, the people who'd been swept and dragged into the cause along with him in their younger days, people he used to call friends, he felt the tiniest glimmer of a will to live. He was angry at the degradation he'd suffered from them, he was angry with the smug satisfaction so many held at seeing him sentenced to death.

To hell with all of them, if he died trying to escape, at least his end would be quick. He never dared try and apparate Draco or Narcissa away from the manor, with the wards modified for the Dark Lord. Their master was the only one who was _technically_ given that particular power.

To try and apparate his family away would have been suicide, but alone he might still be able to manage. Even without a wand. The Dark Lord knew little about the manor's magic, nor the wards which guarded ancestral pureblood homes, a particularly strange oversight considering how intertwined the pureblood agenda was with his cause and purpose.

While he was still alive, he remained Master of Malfoy Manor. His life was in danger, and the house would aid him. It was nearly as sentient as Hogwarts, with thousands of years of magic imbued into its walls. He reached out to his own magic, which he couldn't help think was easier when he wasn't hungover and half dead from exhaustion, and even though it was many years since, he remembered with little fondness his ministry appointed apparition instructor chiming 'Destination, Determination, Deliberation' with a fake smile and a cheesy, overdone enthusiastic tone. Lucius could feel it working, feel himself pulling away from the manor, when he heard Bellatrix's screams, something about him being a blood-traitor and a deserter.

When he apparated in his new location, Merlin knew where he was, he crashed into the ground, groaning. A dagger grazed his shoulder, but the wound only causing half of the pain. It was Bellatrix's dagger, a cursed, Black family heirloom her father had presented her with when she bound herself to a lifetime of faithful servitude to the Dark Lord. If the poison hadn't been seeping through him, he might find it entertaining that the witch had finally parted with it. What would Daddy dearest say about her giving her precious knife to a blood-traitor, as she so eloquently called him during his exit.

He winced again as he moved, pressing the shallow wound with his left hand. It slowed the bleeding, but droplets were still falling to the snow. He couldn't believe he'd made it out of the manor only to die alone somewhere of whatever poison the things was coated with, he could only hope it was created to cause pain, rather than to kill. Truly, he thought, pressing harder against the wound, wasn't certain if he was lucky the dagger had merely grazed him, or if Bellatrix was lucky it had hit its target at all.

He needed wards, he was becoming increasingly aware of how exposed he was. He imagined most of the country was crawling with snatchers by now, and the outcome were they to come across him would not be good. Even if it wasn't yet put out to the public that he was a deserter, he was not a well loved man by the masses. The snatchers were likely to kill him regardless what it was that they had heard, and anyone else on the run would be only more eager.

He winced, moving once again and raising his hands in an attempt to perform the magic. He could feel it fizzle out, not even coming close to the required power for the spell. Instead, he gathered some firewood and tossed it into a pile, lighting it with a quick incendio. That he was able to manage, at least. The smoke might draw people, but at least it would provide a modicum of warmth until he died. He could feel his head going fuzzy, thoughts becoming jumbled as he tried to figure out what to do next. His Dark Mark burned, only adding to the overall discomfort. He could feel his resolve growing weaker, the temptation to apparate back to his Master growing with every passing second, even in full awareness of what waited for him.

He would give up, stop calling eventually, he merely had to wait it out. Eventually, he hoped, Voldemort would have to claim he was dead, or else seem to finally be losing his grip. He prayed that it happened sooner than later, because he couldn't stand the thought of the torture continuing much longer. The pain got worse, both from the poison and from the Dark Mark, he could feel the Dark Lord's displeasure in every inch of his body, and it was a thousand times worse than the pain from the cruciatus.

If there was any doubt left that the man was a sadistic bastard, this would have slashed it. Draco would be feeling something similar, in whatever corner of the globe Narcissa whisked him off to, and he hoped for his son's sanity that she'd had the foresight to bring a pain potion, or maybe even a very powerful sleeping draught.

He couldn't tell he was screaming, the anguished cries being ripped from him carried through the snow covered forest. They drew the attention he'd both expected and dreaded when he was still in a coherent state of mind.

* * *

Hermione was trudging through the snow, contemplating her next move, trying to think how she could possible get back to Harry for them to complete the mission. It was truly an impossible scenario, and she cursed herself for not thinking of the possibility that they would need a meeting point sooner. Grimmauld place remained good and well compromised, and the only other place they'd lived for any length of time was the Forest of Dean, which she knew neither of them would risk after being spotted. She wiped away a stray tear, frustrated, but mostly scared for her friend.

She was considering if she wanted to set wards up here, wherever here was, or move on to someplace different, when the relative peace was interrupted with a bloodcurdling scream. She shivered, suddenly afraid to move, lest whatever it was that was attacking the man make a move on her. It didn't sound so distant, and for a moment, she considered apparating away immediately. She did not want to find herself in even more trouble than she already was. Her gut told her it was the smart thing to do, but the knowledge that it couldn't possibly be the right thing ate away at her until her conscience gave her no other choice.

With her mind made up, and the anguished cries only increasing in volume, Hermione made haste towards the sound, jogging as she got closer, her wand drawn and ready for whatever trouble was waiting for her. She stopped, when she realized she wasn't the only one who'd heard the cries. Snatchers stood by, peering down at the man. One was laughing, apparently finding amusement in his pain, while the other cast some spell at him, which was either a silencing spell, or the killing curse, considering how suddenly the screams had come to a halt.

She was surprised they hadn't noticed her yet, and she pressed herself closer to the tree which blocked her from their sight. If she could take one out by surprise, she could conceivably take the second in a duel. Her eyes fell to their bags, and she knew they'd been living in the forest, hunting muggle-borns on the run from the ministry. Those bags could be a gold mine by way of food and necessities. She wondered if her conscience would let her steal them.

Stepping out from the tree quickly, she shot a stunner towards the woman, narrowly missing when her partner pulled her out of the way. She swore under her breath, ducking behind a shield as a jet of light flew back towards her. After she managed to steady her breathing, she dropped the shield and sent a second stunner, relieved that it hit its intended target.

Lucius was beginning to recover, the pain from the mark dwindling as the Dark Lord was distracted by something he considered more important than retrieving a stray follower. Not that he was complaining, but Lucius was fairly certain that was a mistake. Letting him and Draco go would signal to the others that there was the possibility to defect, to go into hiding. Not his problem any longer, considering he was now firmly estranged from that side of the war.

He was vaguely aware that there was a duel occurring around him, and one of the snatchers crumbled beside him. It took another moment to realize there was still a duel going on, and that by all appearances the woman's rage at her partner's demise fueled her. She was winning, and it wouldn't be long before whoever it was that had stunned the man would be subdued.

Hermione was out of breath, dodging spells at best she could, and her horror was palpable when a jet of green light skimmed by her. This woman was fighting to win, fighting to kill. She ducked behind a tree, relieved that yet another spell passed by her. She would never be the dueller Harry was, even if she was better at every other useless thing they'd been taught at Hogwarts.

She saw another flash of green light illuminate the forest, and heard the sound of a body hitting the ground. Her mouth felt dry, and she peeked around the tree once again, terrified of what she would find.

The second snatcher had fallen, dead, to the ground, and she saw the man they'd cornered earlier with his wand pointed, shaking, in the direction of the spell. She stepped out, her wand still drawn, eyes widening in horror when she realized who it was. Stunned, and terrified, she was about to take the only sensible course of action and apparate away, when his wand dropped, his arm crossing over his chest again as he cradled it biting back what appeared to be a scream.

She pitied him, Circe and Merlin help her, but she felt sorry for the man. She moved forward, halting when she saw a knife in the snow. She leaned over to pick it up, both driven by curiosity, and by fear that he would turn it on her if given the chance.

" _Don't_ touch the blade." he hissed, "it's laced with poison."

Hermione stood straight, staring at him. "Wouldn't that play right into your goals, Malfoy. One less mudblood it the world." She might pity him, but that was where her sympathy ended.

"Spare me." he hissed, letting out another pained rasp, "besides, it won't kill you, as far as I know. I suppose if you let it run it's course in me," he gasped again, "you'll know exactly what it does."

Hermione rolled her eyes, suddenly less sympathetic. The bastard had probably cut himself on his own knife while doing Voldemort's dirty work. She told him as much, smirking when his eyes went comically wide at his master's name.

"You stupid girl, you've killed us both" he said, closing his eyes, hiding a wince, "there's a taboo on his name." he explained, when she looked at him in obvious confusion.

The effect was immediate, Hermione's hand flew to her mouth, horror filling her with the sound of people apparating around them. Before she knew what was happening, she found herself experiencing the familiar feeling of being shoved through a bottle a pulled out again, disappearing from the forest with a loud 'crack'.


	2. Actions have Reactions

**Thank you so much for the favourites/follows and especially reviews on the first chapter! I hope you enjoy chapter 2...I thought this one was really tricky to write, particularly the first half...like always I welcome any type of constructive critism :)**

 **I'm sorry for any mistakes I've made, and if anything is particularly glaring, please let me know...**

When they apparated in their new location, Hermione sprung away from the man who'd grabbed her, fully ready to curse him and run. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest, and fear completely washed over her, leaving her wand trembling in her hand. Rather than finding herself locked in a duel, like she'd expected, she was shocked to see that he'd crumbled back to the ground. After closer examination, he appeared as though he was barely still alive.

 _Just leave him and go_. The sensible part of her hissed. _Let the nasty death eater die, it's no less than he would do for you if your positions were reversed._ Merlin help her though, she wasn't him. She couldn't just watch the man die, or even leave him knowing he would die. It would be different, of course, if he were attacking her. She could shove her conscience aside tolerably well and live with the consequences. For whatever reason though, Malfoy had managed to find himself alone in the forest, screaming in agony and at the mercy of a couple of snatchers. Even if her conscience hadn't been engaged, her curiosity certainly was.

She bent over, slinging his arm over her shoulder. It was almost a relief to her when she realized he was conscious. His efforts to stand made things easier for her, and she guided him towards the river a little ways away. It would be a good spot to set up camp.

"Don't you dare try anything, Malfoy, or I _will_ kill you." she hissed, her heart still beating rapidly in her chest.

"As if you could." he scoffed.

She removed her arm from where it helped keep him in balance, letting him drop unceremoniously to his knees...They'd arrived to the riverside, anyways, and he was hardly prompting her to try and be gentle. _Horrible man_. "Don't test me, Malfoy. I doubt you'll find you like how it ends for you." she said, through gritted teeth.

How dare he be arrogant now, of all times, when he was reduced to this particularly pathetic state. At her mercy, even if he tried to delude himself otherwise. If she hadn't helped him, he would be dead twice over. She would be dead too, if it wasn't for him, she conceded, remembering with a shudder the loud cracks of apparition in their last location.

Careful not to turn her back to him, she began to set up wards. _She should be warding him out_ , the cynical voice continued to shout at her, but she crushed it again. He'd apparated her away with him after she invoked the taboo. That counted for something, she decided. If he'd wanted her dead, he could have left her there. Whatever streak of gratitude led him to bring her along, she would trust in it a for just a little longer. Regardless, she needed to look over his injuries lest he die from an infection after she'd gone through this much trouble for him already.

Digging through her bag, she pulled out her bottle of dittany. There wasn't much. Enough to treat one injury completely, maybe two smaller ones. Before her resolve could be shaken, she squared her shoulders and walked over to him.

"I need to see your arm," she said, meeting his eyes. He looked utterly defeated, completely worn down, and as though he'd given up living. His response was to shrug, wincing as a result of the movement.

A frustrated sigh escaped her lips, and with a huff of air, she fell forward onto her knees to take a closer look at the injury. Pointing her wand at his arm, she freed it from the sleeve, and cleaned the wound. He was glaring at her; she could feel the look he was giving her boring into the side of her head, but she ignored it. _Horrible, ungrateful man_.

Dumping half of her precious potion on the wound, she watched it sizzle and knit itself back together. Without the other half, there would be a scar, but she found she cared very little. Not even out of spite, simply practicality. It made no sense to waste dittany on aesthetics while they were on the run with limited supplies.

Malfoy still wasn't speaking to her. Good. She hoped he felt the weight of his inadequacies, needing to be helped by her of all people, being helped by a _mudblood_. The more bitter it tasted to him, the less she would regret her decision. She sneered back in his direction, even as she began to construct some sort of a shelter by transfiguring nearby branches.

It was an unusually cold day, and even in her winter jacket the air seemed to chill her to the core. She would cast a hundred warming charms once she was out of the elements. Malfoy was shivering, and she noted he clearly hadn't dressed for this particular day. Another small surge of pity coursed through her, and she dug through her bag for one of Harry's sweaters. Once she pulled it out she transfigured it, then tossed it to the frozen looking man. He arranged the woolen blanket over himself, but there was still no acknowledgement of her kindness.

Finally, she managed to complete the shelter, and half dragged Malfoy in next to her. The warming charms were helping, but not nearly as much as she would have hoped. It was as though it was nothing more than an artificial warmth, keeping her body temperature high enough to ward off any danger of hypothermia, but nothing more. She dug through her bag again, pulling out some tea and transfiguring a couple mugs out of spare utensils. She wished that she was back in the smelly tent. She would take the pungent cat odour over being huddled with a Death Eater under a pathetic shelter, one that certainly wouldn't make McGonagall proud, any day.

Hermione filled the two mugs with tea, sticking one of them in the snow next to Malfoy. "Here, at least it's warm." she said, shrugging.

"I don't _need_ your pity, mudblood." he sneered at her. She rolled her eyes, it was exactly what she'd expected from him. Still though, she hated that word. She'd done her best to hide it every time his son taunted her with it, but she'd worked twice as hard to be absolutely sure she would beat him in every class. Just to rub it in his stupid, arrogant, pureblood face that she was better than he was.

"You do need my pity," she said, seething, "and you better remember it."

He picked up the mug, and took a sip of the hot liquid. Frankly, she was surprised he hadn't rejected either the transfigured blanket, or the drink...He must be even colder than she was. They finished drinking it in silence, it was better than any type of conversation that could occur between them. Try what she might, with her hands shaking from the cold, she hadn't been able to get the door even on the top. Through the narrow crack, she now watched the light outside dimming. The sun must be setting, it was signal enough for her to go to sleep.

She considered casting a petrificus totalus on Malfoy before going to sleep. She considered binding his wrists and ankles, and even considered slipping him a strong sleeping draught. In the end, after observing him sit and stare at the door for a while, she decided he wasn't a threat. It was a stupid decision to come to, but the truth was that at that particular point in time, after everything that had happened; Ron walking out on them, the hopeless Horcrux hunt, her separation from Harry, the names of the dead that the radio listed off each day, she didn't want to fight anymore. Even if she didn't wake up the next morning, she wasn't entirely sure she could bring herself to care.

If ever there was an ironic show of pathetic fallacy, it was the birds chirping merrily from outside their crude shelter the next day. She could hear each and every one of their chirps, drilling into her the fact that they led careless lives while she was stuck in hiding with Malfoy. The warming charms had been recast before she awoke, causing her to feel a trickle of joy that she was still alive. Malfoy hadn't seen fit to kill her in her sleep and steal her supplies. It was a small wonder.

He was, however, gone. She wasn't sure if he just couldn't stand to be in the presence of a mudblood a moment longer and had stepped out of the shack she'd made, or if he'd gone for good. She hoped it was the second option, it would spare her the decision of sticking around with him or running away herself. There was a certain safety in numbers that couldn't be denied, but she wasn't sure that she was entirely safe with him. If the man himself wanted her dead, then it certainly negated the purpose.

She stretched, and stood, walking to the door and shoving it open. She was surprised, when she stepped through, to find Malfoy skinning a rabbit by a fire. _It still looked like a rabbit_ , she thought, staring in wide eyed horror at the thing. She was going to be sick.

Looking at the dead, furry little animal all she could think of was finding her first pet, Mr White Rabbit, dead one morning. She thought of the snatcher she'd watched Malfoy kill the day before, and she did throw up. The entire contents of her stomach was spilled at her feet, and she could feel tears running down her cheeks in consequence.

"You killed her…" she said, more to herself than to Lucius, although technically it was to him she was speaking.

"Yes," he said, in his clipped, aristocratic _pompous_ drawl, as though he was agreeing to something far more banal than having killed the woman. He just kept on skinning the rabbit.

Hermione looked at him, her eyes round with horror. Disgust, too, if she were being honest. He could have stunned the woman. He didn't have to murder her in cold blood. At the very least, he could feel some guilt. Some remorse. She wondered how many pieces his soul had been torn into.

She was stuck in the wilds of lord only knew where in the company of a cold hearted murderer. In fact, she could only recognize that he had a heart because she'd seen the blood pouring out of his wound the day before. She pulled out her wand, clutching her beaded bag in her hand, ready to apparate away. She didn't want to stay near him a moment longer. What she'd done the day before was a mistake. An awful, terrible, _horrible_ mistake.

 _Destination, Determination, Deliberation_ , she chimed in her mind, as was habit since she first learned to apparate. Before she could complete the spell, her wand flew out of her hand. Startled, she looked up to see Malfoy holding it, looking at her pityingly.

"What would you have done? Stunned the woman, taken her supplies and left her to starve to death? Freeze?" he drawled. That drawl disgusted her.

Hermione sneered again, she felt like she'd used the expression so frequently since accidentally-on-purpose saving his skin that she would wake up one day to find it permanently etched into her face.

Perhaps that was the reason Narcissa Malfoy perpetually looked like she was smelling something foul - the years spent with her husband. He did, actually, smell bad now that she thought about it...like he'd bathed in firewhiskey. So he was a drunk, to top it all off. She sneered again, quickly trying to return her expression to some semblance of a blank look. She wasn't supposed to sneer - sneering was reserved for petulant Weasleys and bratty Malfoy children. Circe, she hated the man.

He was tangible, he was real. He was a face she could associate a movement to, a person embodying everything she was fighting against. It should have been Voldemort, but somehow the father of her childhood bully fit the bill better. She'd seen him more often, interacted with him on more occasions, and she had personal injuries to resent. It was easier to hate a face you knew, someone concrete.

"Such a noble action that would have been on your part, mudblood." he taunted from his seat across the fire.

"You're a real bastard, Malfoy." she hissed. He looked unperturbed, wearing the same nonchalant, yet condescending look she'd seen him wear since she first met him nearly a decade ago.

"So I've been told before," he acknowledged, "although I can easily refute the claim - my parents were certainly married prior to my conception."

She didn't bother to reply. It wasn't original, it wasn't clever, and he was deliberately misconstruing a very clear statement. _Go to hell, Malfoy,_ she kept that comment to herself, not wanting to deal with anymore of his replies.

"I want my wand back."

"Hmm, really now? And what makes you think I'll oblige you?"

"Just give it back, you owe me."

"Which witch or wizard did you steal this from, Miss Granger?" he asked, practically rolling his eyes at the question. It was the first time she'd heard any change of inflection in his voice that wasn't directly caused by pain. It was almost amusement, but definitely not. Maybe it was bitterness.

"Even you don't believe that tripe." Hermione answered, marching towards him and reaching for the wand, which he was carefully examining. He swiped it away.

If it wasn't seeped in a desire to prove his own superiority, the gesture might have had the appearance of something playful. As it was, Hermione simply felt more helpless, frustrated, and small than she had in a long time. Lucius felt a small amount of pity at the sight, finally handing it back to her.

Hermione walked back into the shack she'd transfigured the night before, collapsing into her makeshift sleeping bag. Lord only knew how much she wanted to cry in that moment. She was so _bloody worried_ about Harry, wherever he'd escaped to. Had he even escaped? Without him, she wondered if there would even be a chance to win the war. He was the person people rallied around, the hope they held onto. Their icon, their mascot. Sometimes, she wondered if they realized he was just a kid who'd had a really awful life.

Laying back she rubbed her temples, trying to tell herself everything would be alright. All would turn out well, they had to win, because they were right. They couldn't let the wrong side win. She thought, once more, of what might have happened to all the eager little first year muggle borns who'd boarded the train to Hogwarts - what had the ministry done with them? Were they shipped off to Azkaban, obliviated and returned to the muggle world, or simply dealt with on the spot. Permanently taking care of the threat.

If they didn't win, would future muggle-borns simply never get their letters, or would they get a different kind of visit than the one she'd had? Bizarrely enough, it wasn't part of the propaganda that was being distributed in mass quantities to the wizarding population. And snatchers, who were they? Were they also victims of a sort? The bottom feeders in a new regime, trying to survive in the only way they could. Malfoy had killed a woman, she'd watched, and worse she'd been grateful that the woman was dead. The tears started to flow for real now, manifesting into sobs.

Lucius listened to the girl crying from outside the shelter, grinding his teeth over her inability to accept and move on. It had been necessary, and it was done swiftly. She'd felt no pain. It was more than he could say for many of the victims that were caught - he'd seen depravity amongst Death Eaters. The Lestrange family and Dolohov were prime examples of it. He'd often tried to get into the buildings first just to kill the targets before they could fall into the hands of people who like to play with their victims.

He wouldn't have treated a dog he didn't like in that manner. He remembered seeing the remains of Ted Tonks, he could barely refrain from vomiting, even after everything else he'd seen. They had butchered the man, his former friend's husband. He didn't even want to think what Andromeda must be suffering, who'd somehow loved him him enough to cut ties with her entire family, everyone who'd loved her. Lucius had never understood, not until it was far too late, and he'd been furious with her for doing as much - nonetheless, it was difficult not to remember the good times they'd had as children.

The mudblood crying for the snatcher irked him. She didn't know, the way he did, what those people were capable of. She hadn't seen the girls in Azkaban, waiting to see if they would die giving birth to their rapist's child, she hadn't seen the state in which they brought the captives to the ministry. The children being carted off of the Hogwarts express, the muggle borns branded and lined up to their fates - Azkaban or the Department of Mysteries, as room allowed. What was happening to the surplus was kept quiet, but he knew there were very few places on Malfoy Manor grounds he would ever want to dig up. It was one of the things that kept him awake at night, and that had been driving his short lived attempt at alcoholism.

Those few who managed to run...he could never begrudge freedom. Doubtless, his doubts were the cause for his fall from favour. At this point, he just continued to hold onto the hope that his son was safe, and cared very little for anything else.

But the crying. It was slowly driving him mad.

He walked towards the shelter, casting a quick cleaning charm on his hands. He was grateful, once more, for the stolen wand from the snatcher. Even if it felt wrong, the past few months without one had been hell to get through. The girl looked up at him for a moment when he opened the door, looking at him as though he were the devil incarnate.

"Stop crying, mudblood." he drawled, hoping that the command might be enough, but somehow doubting it.

"It's none," she hiccuped, "of your bloody business if I cry. If it bothers you, do us both a favour and _leave_."

"That woman doesn't deserve your tears." he added, much more quietly. He watched the girl blink at him, processing what he said. "She was a monster. I saw what she, personally, had done to people she snatched. She didn't deserve compassion."

Hermione snorted, "And this coming from a Death Eater."

She watched as he made to open his mouth, in what defence she didn't even want to know, "I don't know what high ground you think you have, Malfoy. _You_ are only alive because of ill deserved compassion."

"Ted Tonks." he stated, noting she looked up sharply at the name, "his body was dumped in front of the manor by Greyback's group of snatchers. She was so proud, this woman, to say she was the one who'd brought him to justice. I've rarely seen that level of savagery...even in my sister-in-law."

He watched her glassy eyes widen, "they waved around the blood soaked picture of him and Dora's wedding to confirm they'd really killed him, because it was all that was left. I may have been a poor friend to her, but I won't feel any guilt for killing the bastard who killed her husband."

Hermione wasn't sure where to begin addressing his skewed logic. He was a Death Eater, he was one of the people fighting to keep this brave new world.

A swell of rage coursed through her, " _You_ killed her husband. You fought for this, Malfoy. Twice. You fought to eradicate muggle-borns from the wizarding world. You're getting exactly what you wanted so don't you dare, for even an instant, pretend you're any better than that woman!"

Lucius turned away, swallowing the uncomfortable truth he'd been trying to avoid. Repressing the guilt he felt over that one death, in particular. "I don't think it was." he muttered under his breath.

Hermione luckily didn't hear. She glared at the back of his stupid blond head as he walked away, feeling a stronger urge to curse an opponent while their back was turned than she'd felt in a rather long time.

* * *

The next two days passed with little said between the two of them. Hermione found herself surprised that they'd both stuck around, the sad truth being that neither of them had anywhere else to go. Being stranded with a Death Eater...former….maybe...Death Eater spoke volumes to her prospects.

She'd tried desperately to guess the password for PotterWatch both days, with little success. Instead, she was left glaring at the radio, and listening to the official ministry broadcast.

" _We're left with yet another reminder of the importance of dealing with the Mudblood problem after the tragic demise of the Malfoy family at the hands of a small group of them."_ the news reporter stated the facts.

" _With us in the studio is Pansy Parkinson, daughter of a sacred 28 family, and an inspiring young leader in the new Wizarding World. Welcome, Miss Parkinson."_

"' _Thank you, ma'am, it is, truly, an honour to be here.'_

 _I know it's probably difficult for you to talk about so soon after the tragedy, but would you mind telling the listeners a little bit about the Malfoy family?_

' _Draco and I went to school together, but we'd been friends since we were in our nappies. He was barely seventeen, not even out of Hogwarts. Going back without him, it will be one of the hardest things I've ever done. Lucius and Narcissa were wonderful people, always so kind to me, so supportive of their son. Lucius, in particular, was always very involved in politics - in making our world a better, safer place for us all.'_

 _Why do you think they were targeted?_

' _Well, like I said, Lucius's political involvement. He's been the face of our cause to a lot of people, he was vilified following the first war for his involvement with the Dark Lord, he went to Azkaban for standing up to dangerous political extremists. Draco was recently made a Death Eater, at only sixteen. He was so proud, as were his parents. I don't think I need to say any more.'_

 _There were rumours that the Malfoys had fallen out of favour recently, and even that they were no longer entirely loyal to the cause. Was there any truth to this? Or was it merely a machination by the rebels to try and cause a stir?_

' _It was purely made up. Nothing could be further from the truth, and I beg that we don't let their sacrifice be wasted by giving credit to vicious rumour.'_

 _Pansy should be an example to us all, showing such unadulterated strength at such a difficult time in her life. Such eloquence and feeling ought to be strived for, in purebloods and half-bloods alike. Pansy, before you leave, would you mind commenting on what you think people should do next?_

' _First and foremost, I want to say to_ be on your guard _. What happened to the Malfoys could happen to any of us at any time until the Mudblood problem is effectively dealt with. While Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Kingsley Shacklebolt, and other rebels are still out there, there can be nowhere safe. Might I remind you that Harry Potter is wanted not only for his ties to the Order, but for the questionable circumstances surrounding Albus Dumbledore's death? While many of us did not agree with the former headmaster's views, the Ministry of Magic is committed to providing justice for all._

 _If you suspect anyone, even family members or friends, of harbouring a mudblood or another undesirable, or even just having information regarding their whereabouts, I beg of you, for the safety of all of us, to come forward with your suspicions. Report to a ministry councillor, or to the leader of your young people's group. We have to work together, keep vigilant, in order to prevent any more massacres.'"_

The voice came to an abrupt halt, and Hermione looked up from her corner of the tent to see Malfoy standing up after shutting it off. He looked down at where she sat, his face as impassive as ever.

"I'm so glad the media is committed to providing the public with the truth." Hermione said.

"The truth doesn't matter, as long as it confirms what people already believe."

"Does your death at the hands of a vicious group of Mudbloods confirm what you already believe?" she asked, her voice dripping in sarcasm. He turned around, ignoring her once again and walking back outside.

Bored, and emboldened by her boredom, she followed him out. "Where are we?" she asked.

"About a hundred and fifty kilometers west of Malfoy Manor." he replied, not bothering to look at her, but returning to a spell of some sort he seemed to be trying to cast.

"How did you know about this place?" she asked, deciding it was high time they had some sort of conversation.

Lucius heard the question, but thought it in their best interest to keep quiet. The story of the forest they were hiding in did not make for a good bedtime story, it made for some of the nightmares which haunted him since he turned seventeen years old. He continued with his project, casting additional wards around the small chunk of land they'd claimed as their hideout. Magic was a beautiful thing, but both sides had it and he was under no illusion that the Dark Lord actually believed he was dead.


	3. The Semblance of a Life: Part I

**_December 25th, 1997_**

Neither Malfoy nor Hermione had spoken more than ten words together over the past two weeks. She supposed it was nice not to have to put up with anymore of the explosive arguments that tainted the first portion of their new, hesitant partnership. She was still angry thinking back to the one which had sparked their current, rather extended period of silence. How dare he, _how dare he_ say those things to her?

It was very quiet though, and left her far more time to think than she wanted. Being stranded in the middle of nowhere with only an unapologetic bigot for company, when Harry...that thought made her throat dry. Harry, on his own somewhere, without any of their supplies. No tent, no food, not even muggle money...her insides twisted with guilt that she hadn't been able to get to him, and she wasn't even sure words could fully explain how much she missed him.

He was alive though, and he'd escaped the snatchers. If he'd been captured he would have been killed, and Riddle would have proclaimed it to the entire world. He would have taken great pleasure in telling everyone their Chosen One, the destined saviour of the world, was dead. Potterwatch was currently her only source of news, and while it lacked the blatant lies and over exaggerations that made the Daily Prophet and other regime approved materials so dear to her heart, she listened to it with a religious diligence that exceeded even her own usual standards.

She knew it ground at Malfoy's nerves to hear it, but she found that that particular sticking point mattered very little to her. He could go to hell, as long as she was left this place. Sometimes, on particularly bad days, just briefly, she even found herself thinking it would be best for her to help him along.

Curled up on her bench, a less than impressive bit of transfiguration work that she'd established was 'good enough' after her tenth failed effort, she drank her tea. One cup in the morning, and one at night. It was a daily ritual, although she knew she ought to ration the leaves better. Poking at the fire with a stick, a log tipped over, releasing what felt like a new wave of heat. She basked in it.

It was one of the few things she took pleasure in, under current circumstances. She was greedy...she knew it. She ought to be thankful she even had preserves and meat, which she was, but with the smell of campfire ever present around them, she found she was craving marshmallows and sausages.

Again, Hermione shivered when the biting wind assaulted her. It was probably about time for her to go back inside, where the warming charms might have some prolonged effect. Sighing, she shifted, looking for her wand. Cursing, she berated herself for letting it be out of reach. Just because Malfoy hadn't seen fit to try and kill her yet didn't mean he wouldn't, using his own bizarre brand of logic, decide she was expendable sometime in the future. _She needed to be on guard_ , she thought, even as she drifted off into her thoughts, once again losing focus of her surroundings.

A heavy weight fell onto her, something soft, and when she realized what it was, she looked around to find Malfoy. Considering the row they'd had over the rabbit hides, it would have been impossible for her not to notice him working on the blanket over the past month. It had turned out remarkably well, she admitted to herself. He'd obviously used magic to improve the basic item, and it made sense now why he'd done it by hand. The magic seeped into it was much more permanent than any pure transfiguration could have been. It enhanced it, improved its natural qualities, and disguised its faults. It was quite brilliant, and she imagined the thing would be quite rugged. More importantly, it would be quite warm.

Though why it was currently covering her remained a mystery. Her eyes finally met his, communicating every ounce of her immense confusion.

"I assure you, it isn't cursed." he sneered, turning and walking away from her.

"Why?" she asked, annoyed that the question needed to be asked out loud.

"Perhaps it is a peace offering." he said, not even deigning to keep the displeasure at speaking to her from his voice. He hadn't originally intended to give it to her, the blanket was only ever intended to be used by himself, which accounted for the care and diligence he'd applied to the project.

He couldn't identify what it was that made him decide to give her the thing, perhaps misplaced pity or compassion, or perhaps the fact that he detested being in another person's debt. As a new wave of cold hit him, and he was already regretting the decision.

The temptation to start another row was there. She wanted to throw it in his face, just as he'd thrown her first attempts at kindness back. Despite that, the blanket was warm, and she wanted to keep it...even if it was from him. "Thank you," she added as a definite afterthought.

"You are welcome." he said, it appeared by his expression that the words might strangle him for being spoken.

Walking back into the cabin, he muttered under his breath, just quiet enough for it to escape her notice, "Happy Christmas, mudblood."

 _Hermione_. Her name was Hermione, and they were going to be stuck together in this hovel for far longer than he was comfortable thinking about. He needed to make an effort at civility, if only so they didn't end up killing each other.


	4. The Semblance of a Life: Part II

**_January 28th, 1998_**

Lucius pulled a mug out of the cupboard in their small shack, 'cottage' she called it. He was fairly certain she was making a joke, a three room building that housed two beds, a table, and a kitchen, if it could be called that, wasn't-couldn't-be anything but a shack. Particularly because of how cold it was. He was certain that all the warming charms they could cast wouldn't be enough to keep out the chill that night. Already, he'd pulled on his warmest cloak and cast a number of charms on both it and the cabin. The silver lining was that they were far more prepared for the sudden drop in temperature than they would have been weeks ago. They'd closed off the entire shelter, had devoted over a week to piecing together more hide blankets, and stored up a good amount of food in the process.

Conjuring water, he rinsed the mug in the sink, as was his ritual. He refused to think of what kind of crawling critters made their way into them when the cupboards were closed. Hermione seemed to think it was endlessly funny that he was _afraid_ of insects, no matter how often he insisted he merely didn't appreciate finding them in his drink.

He was certain, actually, that she would never cease harassing him about the subject until the day he died. Or the day she died, if they were discovered and things took a turn for the worst. It wasn't a thought he liked to dwell on. _That_ was something he was afraid of, he could easily admit to himself. It was easy to fall into a routine out here, in what Hermione referred to as the 'middle of nowhere'. It was a vulgar, muggle sort of phrase, but he couldn't help think it suited the place perfectly.

He certainly would never admit it to another soul, least of all the girl herself, but he'd grown quite fond of the mudblood. She was stubborn and opinionated, absolutely fierce, but she was also oddly playful. It wasn't something he inspired in many people, but she'd plowed past his scowls and harsh comments...likely for the simple reason that living in constant silence was maddening. The first few time she dared mock him, he'd been livid. He found he didn't mind quite so much anymore, especially since her jokes had lost some of the bitter undercurrent they held at first. He tried not to notice the resignation in them.

His task accomplished, and the mug suitably sanitized, he stepped outside, quickly shutting the door behind him.

She made quite the picture, Lucius could help but think. Huddled under the thick rabbit hide blanket he'd made for her, drinking tea from her transfigured mug by the fire. A silvery otter danced around her, and he could see the tip of her wand just peaking out from under the blanket, allowing as little of the cold, January air in as possible. She really was an impressive witch, to be conjuring a corporeal patronus.

When he stepped forward, she turned her head to smile at him, following his motions as he sat across the fire, across from the mudblood girl, _Hermione_ , he quickly corrected in his mind. Lucius sternly reminded himself, like he did nearly each and everyday, not to let the slur slip. It was in his best interest not to, at best it would result in finding himself listening to a barrage of monologues on the subject, and he wasn't entirely certain he wanted to contemplate the worst case scenario.

"Tea?" she asked, to which he nodded. "Catch!" she said, more muggle nonsense, tossing the bag to him in a surprisingly well aimed throw. He shivered, pulling his cloak closer to his body. He could see her hesitating over something.

"You're practically screaming your conflicting emotions, just say what is on your mind." he said, in his same slow drawl that she'd gotten used to over the past little while, drawing a smile to her lips.

"I was thinking of telling you-and before you scoff at me, remember _you_ asked-that you should come sit under the blanket with me. It's much warmer."

Lucius blinked, and only years of hiding his emotions kept his surprise in check. She continued to look at him somewhat expectantly, and the girl seemed almost disappointed when he didn't move to sit next to her. If ever there was a mystery, that was one. He pondered her words further, not only sit next to her, but sit under the blanket with her. It was such an odd notion, he couldn't make head nor tail of it. Before he could respond, he realized he'd held his silence half a moment too long.

"Fine, stay on your side of the fire and freeze, if you're that worried that my _muggle_ blood will contaminate you in such close proximity." her voice was bitter, dripping in disdain and sarcasm, and he wondered what on earth had aroused the onslaught he was receiving. The truce he'd managed to instigate on Christmas day seemed to have held this long. "I really think I forgot who I was dealing with for a while, _Lucius_ almost didn't come across as an unapologetic bigot who hates me for no reason at all."

"Are you quite finished, Hermione?" Lucius asked, his own voice taking on a colder tone than she'd heard over the past few weeks. It threw her, although she supposed her own angry rant was what produced it. Her patronus dimmed, though it continued to glide through the air surrounding the fire.

Lucius wanted to vilify her for her comments, push as hard as he could and see if she would push back, but the logical part of him reminded him that he was stranded 'in the middle of nowhere' with only this girl for company. And push back, she would, there was no doubt. Things were far more pleasant when they weren't at each other's throats, and already, he saw her eyes narrowing in preparation for a fight, and tilt her head like she did when she was ready to defend her opinion until her throat was sore and her voice was hoarse.

"I was contemplating how best to transfigure the bench, if you absolutely must know. You must realize that it's hardly your best work" he sneered while standing, placing more weight on his wooden cane then he felt was entirely appropriate at his age. He tried not to contemplate it too closely, because that tended to lead somewhere that resembled regret, which, of course, was completely unacceptable. He tried not to contemplate the fact that he'd just lied to spare a mudblood's feelings, because that might even be worse. Keeping his face impassive, he walked across to her to make his point, pulling her up, and wrapping the blanket around her.

She looked rather comical, surrounded in the overlarge blanket, her hand barely sticking out holding her mug. He took the cup of hot tea from her, placing it next to his on the ground, and pushed her hand under the blanket. Transfiguring the bench was not a difficult task, and after a few moments, it looked more or less as he'd envisioned it.

Only after she tried to spread out the blanket did it become apparent how small it was. They each took a turn shifting uncomfortably, and he moved closer to her, hardly happier with the idea than the girl herself. While Hermione was beating herself over the suggestion, he was still mindful that to move now would likely spark up the argument again. By any stretch of the imagination, it wasn't something he wanted to rehash. He felt her move into his side, leaning against him, and he tried to ignore everything but the fact that she'd been right, it was much warmer under the blanket with her.

She cast her patronus again, and he watched the silvery otter float about them. He jumped when it brushed past his shoulder, causing Hermione to laugh once again. She was relieved to have something to say.

"Scared of bugs, scared of otters...my, my, Lucius. Quite the fearsome figure you are." she teased.

Lucius just shook his head, deciding that anything he said would be turned around against him. Instead, he opted to pull out his wand and cast his own patronus, there was something comforting about them. _Mesmerizing_ even. A silver falcon joined Hermione's otter, flying high before swooping down to them once more.

Hermione closed her eyes for a moment. The Order had been very adamant at one time that Death Eaters could not produce corporeal patronuses. It was published in books on the first war and everything. The notion always seemed absurd to her...dehumanizing. Devastating, even, if it were true. Everyone needed a happy memory, even those whose lives were corrupted with hate. The first time they performed magic, a particularly good birthday, arriving at Hogwarts, their first love, the day they were married, the birth of a child. She smiled, relieved they'd been wrong.

"Trust your patronus to be a predator," she said.

He raised an eyebrow at her, "Otters are such friendly creatures. They're often considered harmless as a result...I'm sure though," he said, "that is hasn't escaped your notice that they are, also, quite capable predators."

He watched her smile grow, before faltering for a moment as she turned her head, taking another sip from her mug. "What was actually going through your mind when I asked you to sit with me..." she asked.

She moved, and he was acutely aware, once more, of her weight against his side. She'd shifted to lean more of herself onto him, primarily to have enough length of blanket on her other side to completely block out the cold. In another situation, in another life, the behaviour might come across as scandalously forward. On their wooden bench, buried under the fur blanket, it was about drawing and providing comfort in an awful situation.

He surprised both of them when he moved his arm around her waist, nudging her slightly so that her sharp shoulder no longer dug into him quite as painfully. It was strange, to let this girl, so wholly unconnected to him, cuddle, for lack of a better term, against him.

It was strange and new, but he was surprised that it didn't follow that it was bad. However poorly conceived an idea, he decided to try yet another new idea. The world was hardly about to halt if he did, and the severest consequence that might come of it was her, admittedly sharp, elbow digging into his ribs.

"Being asked to sit with you, share a blanket with you, is an oddly intimate notion. It just isn't done. Not with family, nor with anyone else." he said, quite simply.

It was Hermione's turn to raise an eyebrow. It was such a strange thing to say, particularly considering it was strange for him to say anything personal at all.

"And you find it acceptable with a mudblood?" she asked, he went to protest, but she shook her head, "I'm not going to attack you for it today, I'm genuinely curious. You've fought against muggle-borns being included in the wizarding world _longer than I've been alive_. I'm not stupid, Lucius. I'm well aware of what you think of me, even if I find it appalling."

She felt his hand tighten on her waist for a moment, before he relaxed again and let out a sigh.

"I haven't let it slip in well over a month, for two reasons." he said, and she made a small, slightly angry, humming noise, encouraging him to continue. "Because I am genuinely afraid of what you might do to me if I do, and if that isn't an acknowledgment of my respect for you as a witch nothing could be."

"What's the second?" she asked, still sounding less than pleased with him, although she hadn't physically moved away, which he considered a win of sorts.

"Because it would hurt you, and I have no intention of doing so."

He felt her head whip up quickly, and she huffed out a snort, "Really?" she asked, the sarcasm in her voice reminding him once again of just how young this girl was.

"You have to know it, on some level, or else I assume I would still be sitting across from you. Perhaps, even, you would have already moved on to a different location, alone."

Hermione hummed in agreement, burying herself further into his warmth, using it as a shield against the biting January air. She could psychoanalyze Lucius's, and her own, behaviour later. For now she just wanted to enjoy one of the few moments of something akin to genuine companionship she'd experienced since being separated from Harry.


	5. The Semblance of a Life: Part III

**I just wanted to thank everyone who has followed/favourited/reviewed! It means a lot to me :)**

 **I won't be updating again until the end of April, exams and all that...thanks for being patient with me!**

 ** _February 14th, 1998_**

Lucius stepped out of the cabin, not surprised to see Hermione huddled under the fur blanket next to the crackling fire. It was a morose looking day, with the clouds covering the sky completely. The sun was hardly peaking through, though it appeared to be making a valiant effort. It was warmer than it had been in a while though, _silver linings_ , he supposed. Bloody muggle phrase he couldn't quite expunge from his mind.

He went to join her, leaning his cane up against the back of the bench before sitting down, as had been their routine since that first time well over a month ago. They didn't usually talk much, just kept warm and enjoyed silent companionship. Sometimes Hermione asked him a question about something she'd read about, or talked about her parents. She missed them, that much was obvious. It was eating away at her that she'd shut them out for so many years, culminating in obliviating them before going on the run.

He was surprised though, that instead of her usual green tea, she was taking swigs out of a bottle of firewhiskey. "Happy Valentine's day, Lucius." she said, offering him the bottle.

He took it, and took a swig himself. It had been a few months since he'd felt the warmth of alcohol going down his throat.

"You never told me you had this." he said, examining the bottle of cheap liqueur.

"I guess I was saving it for a special day." she said, looking at it skeptically. "I'd forgotten about it, to be perfectly honest. I didn't even mean to pack it. It was Ronald's, and I shoved it in the bag to hide it from Mrs Weasley at the wedding."

"Looking to be reminded of the Weasley boy today, of all days?"

Hermione rolled her eyes, "Ronald was on the run with Harry and I, he abandoned us after deciding Harry and I were having some sort of sordid affair, and keeping secrets from him."

"And were you?" Lucius asked, weirdly curious about it.

She scoffed, rolling her eyes. "Oh course not, he's always been paranoid, and it got worse when he started wearing-" Hermione's breath hitched, and she was aware she'd nearly just divulged the Horcrux secret to Lucius. The man was looking at her oddly, but didn't press it. "We weren't together, Harry's like the brother I never had. He's completely devoted to Ginny." Hermione said, a sad smile forming on her lips.

"Ron had no reason to think that way, but he did. I think that it's what stamped out any possibility of me feeling more than friendship for him. I could never trust him to stick around when things were difficult for him. I was always there when he needed me, but when I needed him I could never count on him returning the favour. Being together, it would have been convenient, more than anything. Tidy."

"Then he left, and you and the Potter boy were split. Things are anything but tidy now, aren't they?" Lucius said, pulling her closer to his side when he felt her shiver. It was warmer than it had been in a while, but it was still such a damn cold day.

"Definitely not tidy." she agreed. Not completely keeping the pain from her voice, she took another swig of firewhiskey. There hadn't been much to begin with, only a few shots' worth. Now there was maybe only a single sip left. She handed it back to Lucius, who examined the bottle more closely. Hermione watched him carefully, wondering if he was irked to be drinking firewhiskey that once belonged to a Weasley, or if he was irked over sharing it with a mudblood. She kept her thoughts to herself, deciding she didn't want to have confirmation, in case it was the latter.

"I was married for nineteen years to Narcissa," he said, apparently feeling particularly chatty that morning, "and when she fled with Draco, she broke our marriage bond so that I couldn't use it to help track her down."

Hermione looked at him, "She was very thorough, it seems."

"She thought I would drag her, and my son back to the Dark Lord to be killed." he said, "she ended our marriage because she thought I would pick my allegiance to a madman over my son's life."

For the first time in months, Hermione saw him visibly shaken. She examined him for another moment before speaking. "She didn't know you very well, did she?"

"I could never begrudge her for taking Draco away from there, I would've myself, if I could have thought of a way to leave the country without being traced. At the time though, it seemed safer to stay. How she got into the study to use the Dark Lord's floo entrance, I still haven't figured out. I don't even begrudge her leaving me behind, but I'll admit it was-what was the expression you use? A slap in the face? To realize how little she thought of me after all that time." Hermione didn't say a word, just continued to snuggle into his side, listening and feeling her heart break for him.

At the beginning of December, she would have agreed with Narcissa's decision. Defending it as only logical, but seeing the heartbreak on the older Malfoy's face, she couldn't fathom what made the woman think it was required. He would have died a thousand times over before betraying his son. He would have thrown any and every other person over to the Dark Lord without a second thought if it furthered his purpose, sure, but he never would have been a danger to his family. Family loyalty, whatever bizarre family loyalty he abided to, meant everything to him.

"I'll admit I was far from an idyllic husband to her, but I was never cruel. I never hurt her, and I never thought I gave any cause to doubt that I loved my son."

"I'm sorry," Hermione said, biting her lip to refrain from saying anything else. He wouldn't appreciate her ramblings just now.

"No...I suppose I've brought it all on myself." he said.

"Maybe," Hermione acknowledged truthfully, "but it doesn't make it any less sad."

They kept sitting long after they fell into silence again, with the empty bottle of firewhiskey at their feet.


	6. The Semblance of a Life: Part IV

**March 10th, 1998**

Lucius was trying to carve the muggle way, and he would have wondered what could possibly possess him to do so if he wasn't painfully aware of the answer. He was beyond bored, beyond exhausted of doing nothing but make work projects on their cabin, which as a result of his and Hermione's efforts, now looked rather splendid as far as cabins could.

They'd magically expanded the inside, creating two proper bedrooms, a dining room they never used, furnished with a table set that was determined to remain dreadfully uncomfortable, and a kitchen they daren't store much food in in case they needed to make a quick escape. Instead, everything remained in her rapidly failing beaded bag.

The sitting room they used on occasion to play cards, which they'd transfigured from leaves in a particularly tedious project one afternoon. What he was making? Nothing particularly useful. It started off with him merely chipping away at a block of wood still laying around slowly turning it into a creature. Possibly. At the moment, it had four uneven legs, and the semblance of a head. Nothing distinct enough to look like any particular species.

It was frustrating, that a muggle could do something he couldn't. Just the principle, the very notion of it. He would have called Hermione a liar over it, told her there was no possible way her muggle grandfather could do something as absurd as create shapes as complicated as she said without magic, but he could tell when she lied. She got a certain determined look to her face that he would never have learned to place without spending nearly every waking moment with the witch.

The point remained that if a muggle could do it, so could he, and he resolutely vanished the first carving, and set about working on a new one, which hopefully wouldn't have to also be banished to save his pride. It did, as it turned out.

She was pacing somewhere behind him, which usually led to her asking a bizarre, or plainly offensive question out of absolutely nowhere. She would sit there afterwards, next to him, looking up at him with her doe eyed look, expecting him to say something in response. It bothered him, more than a little bit, that when he could no longer take the silent pleading she usually did get her response.

"Lucius," she started, sitting down on the bench next to him. And so it began. "Are you my friend?"

He resolutely continued to scrape at the piece of wood, convinced this effort was already working out better than his last.

"Why would you ask such an asinine question?" he asked, his voice giving away that he was truly exasperated. How could he even begin to answer that question, he had no idea.

Were they friends, he wondered in his own mind. Maybe. It was an odd question, and heavily dependant on what the term friendship meant to her. He'd spoken to her more about his life, and confessed more things than he had to any other living person. He knew her quirks and habits, he would wager, better than any other living person. She trusted him with some things, although he knew she was still working on something for Potter, which she hadn't seen fit to tell him about. Friendship implied trust, did it not? That had to work both ways.

She was also a mudblood. There was some lingering doubts in his mind about her, wholly unrelated to any action or word she'd spoken, where he simply couldn't get past the fact. He could acknowledge her a capable, competent witch, but she was still a mudblood. As irrational as she might claim it to be, if asked whether or not he believed himself her superior because of blood under a truth serum, he couldn't say what his answer would be.

"I suppose that's my answer." she said, standing up and walking back into the cabin.

Stupid girl, he thought. Although part of him scolded himself for thinking it. It was merely a question, coming from someone who saw fit to be curious about everything, it wasn't really that strange. There was too much time to think, he'd already established, in their secluded little piece of the world.

She sulked for the rest of the day, refusing to look at him or speak when they ate lunch, then dinner. He thought the days were gruelling before she decided to give him the silent treatment, but now it was unbearable. With her out of the way after dinner, it was lonely sitting by the fire. He tried to imagine being stuck in their little haven with anyone other than her, and found that he couldn't picture it, nor did he want to.

By the time the sun was well and truly set, and the fire died out completely, he was beyond irritated that she still hadn't shown her face. He was beginning to consider knocking down her door, but he wasn't entirely sure what he would say then. He still couldn't bring himself to say that they were friends. The word just stuck in his throat, and it felt wrong to force it out.

He heard, rather than saw the door open. She kicked it shut behind her, still obviously in a mood after the day they'd had. He looked at her, and for the first time since she'd stormed off earlier, she returned the look. It was absolutely fierce, just daring him to scold her for behaving like a child, and promising nothing good it he did. Instead, he walked over to her and blocked her pathway.

"I would rather be stuck here with you than anyone else, and I enjoy your company." he drawled, hoping she would take his peace offering, because it was as far as he was willing to go.

She looked at him, and he could see a million things go through her head. "But are we friends, Lucius?" she asked again, determined to wrench it out from him.

He smirked, raising a hand to cup her face, and trailing his thumb along her cheekbone. "Do you never leave well enough alone?"

She grinned, leaning into his hand, "I suppose not." she answered.

He let it drop after a moment, wondering what had possessed him to touch her that way. It was a friendly gesture, he tried to tell himself. If he hadn't spent far too much time leering at her inappropriately, he might even believe it. What he was, was a dirty old man-lusting after a girl his son's age. A mudblood, no less. It was disgusting, but he couldn't even convince himself he was merely lusting after her. The horrifying truth was that he actually liked her, obnoxious personality, bushy hair, and all. He moved to his room, trying to tell himself he hadn't reached that conclusion, and cursing her and her absurd questions. Friends indeed.

 **I couldn't resist writing more even if I should be studying...**

 **I was wondering what people thought of the shorter chapters? I originally planned on making these all part of one, really long, chapter to develop their interactions before diving back into the main plot after. Basically the goal was to make (approximately) a year go by with them hiding together before delving into more of the war and what's going on outside of their bubble. Part of me wonders if I should have just skipped over it, or done flashbacks...or set about it in another way that I can't think of.**

 **As always, if you've got time I would absolutely love feedback on my writing! Thanks for all the follows/favs/reviews, and thanks for reading! :)**


	7. The Semblance of a Life: Part V

**April 8th, 1998**

"I have a thousand reasons to hate you, and I promise each one is better than the last."

He wasn't entirely certain what led to their yelling match. The day started off just fine, even if it was just as dull as usual. Somehow though, one thing led to another, and here they were. She'd thrown his past in his face, thrown some confessions he'd made of the most painful moments of his life, in the cruelest way possible...and now this. He was well aware that an exemplary life wasn't what brought him to where he was now, but having it pointed out by someone, particularly someone he'd come to view as a friend of sorts, gouged a deeper wound than he would like to admit to. Rather than let himself feel that pain too acutely, it was much easier to fall back on anger. It was a habit, really, by now in his life: to hate and resent.

She glowered at Lucius, who looked back with his own murderous rage. "Well, do tell me what these reasons are." he hissed, gesturing for her to continue.

"The punishments you made Dobby suffer through? You made him iron his hands. You threatened to kill him multiple times a day."

He scoffed, causing her to redouble her anger, "You treated him abominably." she said.

"And my behaviour towards a house elf, of all things, is enough to damn me completely in your mind." he replied, eerily quiet.

She'd calmed down, at least outwardly. Resuming her task, flipping through her book.

"It is the way one treats his inferiors more than the way he treats his equals which reveals one's real character*. Sirius also said something to that effect, once. Before your ambush in the Department of Mysteries which led to his death."

"I've treated you just fine." he muttered.

Her book snapped shut, and she looked at him. He'd crossed a line, he knew, but so had she. "Would you care to repeat what you've just said?"

Her voice took on an icy edge to it, he might have been afraid of her, but he was too angry himself to care. "Very well, I said that I've treated you just fine."

"I hate you." she said, walking towards him, "I thought I hated your son. Arrogant little worm that he was. He said that he wished I would die, did you know? When you gave an eleven year old girl a diary so seeped in Dark Magic it possessed her and loosed a basilisk on the school.

He provoked the hippogriff in third year, acting like an utter imbecile in class. Then, he was laughing over his execution. You know, though, I'd never really expected anything different from him. He was always a nasty, scared little boy, right up until he let the Death Eaters into the castle, and I expect even after.

But I'll admit, you almost had me convinced you were a decent human being. I'm disappointed I was wrong." her voice was catching, and her eyes shinning with tears she held back in an attempt to preserve dignity, "You, Lucius Malfoy, are nothing more than a racist, clinging to an illusion of superiority. You should know, after all the blood you've seen, that muggle blood is just as red as yours. My father doesn't have magic, but he's a hundred times the man you are. My mother doesn't have magic, but she doesn't need it. She's brilliant, and kind. I'm proud of my family, and I'm proud of myself."

"Hermione…" Lucius said, seeing the tears she'd been trying to hold back fall.

"Don't talk to me, Malfoy. After everything I've suffered because of people like you, I think I'm allowed a little righteous anger. Do something productive, would you, and go get yourself killed." she sneered, storming back into the cabin, slamming the door behind her.

Cursing, Lucius shot a spell at a nearby tree, watching with twisted satisfaction as it was completely annihilated, branches, leaves and all. Damn that girl.

(*I think this is attributed to Rev. Charles Bayard Miliken, Methodist Episcopal, Chicago)

* * *

 ** _May 27th, 1998_**

"Blackberries, Lucius!" Hermione exclaimed, rushing back into the cabin. He looked up from his book, about to say something, when to his extreme shock, the fruit was shoved into his mouth.

The girl hadn't spoken to him in over a month, and seemed to be taking extreme pleasure in finding little ways to let him know just how repugnant he was. He'd tried to apologize, even if it was less than sincere. Ridiculous, being upset over his treatment of house elves. He'd even given some sort of monologue about how he saw the errors of his ways. He knew she believed him, he'd convinced many older, more experienced witches and wizards of his sincerity in the past. He could tell she'd even considered speaking to him again, over the course of the last few days. But she hadn't cracked until now.

"Is it required for you to behave like such an absolute child in order to enjoy these?" he drawled. She rolled her eyes, sitting down with her bowl of fruit and grinning wide again. He watched her pop another one into her mouth, savouring it. He could admit that, despite the unpleasant way in which he was forced to eat the fruit, it was a welcome change from preserves and rabbit.

"Stop being ridiculous, Lucius." she ordered, in her usual uppity voice, "You're the one who sounds like a grumpy child. You cannot possibly upset me today."

It was something about the way she said it, completely dismissing him after he was rightfully put out with her behaviour. How dare the mudblood treat him with such utter disrespect. He was about to tell her exactly who it was who was being ridiculous, tell her exactly what was on his mind, when she moved to sit next to him, sidling up to him and handing him the bowl. "I picked extra for you."

He felt so ashamed.

* * *

 **June 20th, 1998**

He watched her digging through that sodding beaded bag of hers, looking for something like a muggle rather than simply casting an accio spell as any reasonable witch or wizard would. He considered reminding her of the fact that she was, despite his own and the wizarding world's best protests, a witch. Just like she'd been able to expand the inside of that bag, she would be able to summon something with just a flick of her wand. He didn't though, as it happened, he had far too pleasant of a view to give up by pointing it out.

When the weather started to frequently hit above twenty degrees, she cut the bottom portion of her jeans and started to wear them as shorts. Both of those muggle clothing inventions he could live with quite well at the moment, although the thought of any female related to him going out in public wearing something like that would have left him utterly horrified. The jeans and shorts were just fine, so long as he was the only one enjoying the view they provided.

She stood up, straightening and turning back towards him. Apparently, an incredibly inefficient victory was now hers. He made a point to look elsewhere before she spotted him looking at her, because, Merlin forbid, he did not want her to know just how much he looked at her.

She sat down cross legged on the ground and started cutting the parchment into squares. He didn't think there was much shame in watching now, since he was trying to figure out what in the seven circles of hell she was doing. His question was answered when she started to fold a sheet of parchment into something and then further when she stood, bit her bottom lip, and seemed to aim for an empty area of their camp and threw the thing.

The parchment thing raised into the air and dived, after an incredibly unimpressive flight, nose first into the dirt. He looked at her skeptically, shaking his head and standing to go back into the cabin. Clearly, the girl he was stranded with had regressed so far into madness she thought throwing folded parchment into the air made sense.

He kept watching her from the window inside the cabin. She wasn't paying a whit of attention to him, and that was just fine. He wasn't sure whether to smile or frown. The war had affected her, the political instability throughout her childhood, the mental trauma that had to result from nearly being killed as often as she had been, but she still looked so innocent, pouring over her paper things and throwing them into the distance, accio-ing them, redesigning them, and then starting all over. She was innocent when it came down to it. She didn't have blood on her hands, she didn't have anything to regret, she hadn't seen a fraction of what so many others had. He didn't resent her for it, but he did envy her the ability to smile and laugh as easily as she did.

She'd grown up in a pleasant household, brought up by parents who, despite being muggles, loved their daughter more than anything; it was obvious from her stories, from the way she light up when talking about them. It struck him that he never had that. His mother had died shortly after his birth, a fact that, from what he'd heard, might in fact have against all odds increased his chances for a happy childhood, and his father was less than exemplary.

Abraxas Malfoy was a weak man, he craved acceptance and he craved power, but he never had either. His idea of acceptance was joining the Dark Lord in their school days, following the half-blood Slytherin and worshiping him like he was a god. His idea of power was cursing his child, or fucking underage mudblood girls who could be bought for cheap costume jewelry and a few misleading, sweet words.

Lucius had fought, tooth and nail, not to turn into his father, to differentiate himself from Abraxas. For a while, he succeeded. He'd had the respect that his father was never awarded, was feared by those he wished to intimidate, he had a child who grew up without the threat of the cruciatus if he didn't achieve 'Outstandings' in every class. And yet here he was, a branded Death Eater who'd simpered and pandered to gain acceptance from the same man, and he was still watching Hermione as the girl played outside like a child - a girl who could have been his child. He turned around, walking away from the window, longing for either dreamless sleep potion or very potent firewhiskey.

* * *

 **July 12th, 1998**

Hermione glanced over her book to see Lucius sitting, staring out into the distance. It was rather unusual to see him doing nothing, and she couldn't recall seeing him do anything that even had the semblance of being productive throughout the day.

She followed his gaze, wondering if there was anything in particular he was looking out towards. There wasn't, just the dark, endless expanse of greenery that had become so familiar. He appeared troubled, although Hermione was astounded she even recognized the expression on a man to whom looking troubled meant his jaw was shut marginally tighter than usual.

She moved over to the bench, enjoying the slight breeze that cooled the otherwise scalding July air. Sitting next to him, she pushed his shoulder slightly, needling him in the hopes of provoking a reaction of sorts. He sighed, looking towards her with a frown.

"You're acting particularly sulky today, and I was wondering why." Hermione said, pursing her lips at him. She could admit that boredom was getting the best of her recently, but it didn't help to mope about it. Watching else someone mope about was likely going to inspire her to do the same, as much as she wished it wouldn't.

"Today is my birthday." he said, after a long pause where she was convinced he wouldn't say a word.

"You didn't tell me," Hermione said. She was a little put out that he hadn't mentioned it. A birthday party, even the rather pathetic one it would have had to be, would have given her something to obsess over besides Harry being stranded and alone, or her inability to narrow down a list of potential Horcruxes.

"I did not particularly want it acknowledged." he said, letting out a sigh.

"Why not? Celebrate that you lasted another year without being offed by Riddle." she said, dramatically throwing her hands in the air, before sinking down on the chair beside him.

He shot her a wry smile, and huffed out a self deprecating laugh. Instead of responding, Lucius stood, stretching for a moment. He turned back towards the girl, bringing his hand up to cup her cheek. When he felt her lean into the gesture, as she had before, he brushed back her hair with his other hand, tangling his fingers in the curls. No sooner had he done that, and he started to think about pulling her closer, did he drop his hands and turn around.

She watched him walk away after his cryptic non-answer, and wondered what could possibly have led to him thinking this was a good time to go wander off on his own for a walk. She could still feel her cheek where he'd touched her, and a light blush graced her face.

She'd tried to pass off the gesture as friendly, or, worse still, fatherly, the first time it had occurred. That thought was banished quickly, and upon establishing there wasn't a single way to interpret it which wouldn't lead to a whole whirlwind of self loathing, she made the executive decision not to interpret it at all. Easier decided than acted on, but she'd almost kept her resolution, instead focusing on all the consequences of not maintaining her resolution. The outcome, admittedly, was just about the same.

Her initial reaction was almost laughable, really. Despite his age, there was nothing about him that was even remotely fatherly. At least, not to her. She supposed Draco going on about 'father this' and 'father that' while at Hogwarts must have meant he'd seemed fatherly to him. She found she didn't like to dwell on the fact that her former classmate was his son, even if she'd gained an almost uncomfortable amount of information about Draco through their conversations.

Friendly seemed off as well, although she'd prodded some sort of declaration from him a while back. Well, it wasn't so much that is was off, then that she wanted it to be off. Harry or Ron, heaven help them wherever they were, would never have ventured to do as much. It didn't seem like a particularly instinctive gesture from the cold, proud man either. He definitely wasn't one to wear his heart on his sleeve, frankly, she had absolutely no trouble seeing how it was that people wondered if he even had a heart.

Attributing any romantic interest to it seemed pathetic. She was not yet so lonely that she needed to dream up romance with a man who was over twice her age, who'd never look at her as anything but a child, or worse, a mudblood child. Whatever twisting knife appeared when she thought of that option wasn't worth torturing herself over. Neither was the thought that they'd merely been without any other human contact for so long that he was touching her out of desperation for any reminder that he wasn't alone.

Silencing her overactive imagination, she stood up. "Insufferable man." she muttered, chasing to catch up to him now that he was well past their inner wards.

"Lucius!" she yelled, causing him to slow down, but not stop walking. "Lucius!" she called out again, this time halting his step. When she finally caught up, she slipped her arm into his, and glared up at him. "You can't just up and leave in the middle of a conversation. It's quite rude."

"Well at least it isn't very rude, now where would that leave me? What about during an interrogation?" he said, the corners of his mouth pulling into a smile.

"Especially not during an interrogation. You know it drives me absolutely mad when you avoid my questions."

* * *

 **August 9th, 1998**

He could hear her sobbing in the other room. It wasn't a wholly uncommon occurrence. He figured they were part of the price to pay for her uncompromising strength at every other moment of every other day. For the first few months he simply pretended he didn't hear her, and didn't notice her red rimmed eyes the next day. It subsided after a while though, even if it never completely disappeared.

He didn't even have trouble admitting, anymore, that he felt guilty every time he ignored it. He just wasn't sure what else to do, how to provide comfort to the crying witch. There was nothing he could say that would make it better, and nothing he could do would fix whatever it was that caused her heart wrenching sobs night after night. They'd come back with vigor over the past month, which did absolutely nothing to quell his guilt.

Not for the first time, he stood, and made his way to her door, poised to knock, or just invite himself in. It was, however, the first time he managed to convince himself to cross the threshold.

She was bundled under a blanket, laying on the bed, curled in on herself and facing away. She hadn't even heard him enter, too caught up in her grief. He made his way to her side, sat on the edge of the bed and rested his cane against the bedside table. He felt her still, and her head turned towards him. She was a mess, he noted, between snot and tears, and the puffiness they gave her face. Her hair was more of a rat's nest than he'd ever seen it before, some of it caked onto her cheek by the wetness. He sighed.

"Go away." she murmured, turning back towards the wall. She looked so vulnerable.

"I don't think so." he replied, clipping his tone as he moved further onto the bed, running a hand over her hair, pulling it away from her face. He didn't dare comb his fingers through her curls, lest they be permanently stuck.

"I'm fine." she said, sitting up slightly. Her voice was more forceful this time, but he didn't move. He'd be damned if he let her keep crying on her own, it had gone on for long enough.

He looked her over, almost letting himself roll his eyes. He was picking up horrible habits from the girl. "Obviously." he drawled, sarcasm dripping from the word.

She renewed her sobbing, apparently giving up on trying to be left alone, because she moved to his side and buried her face against him. He tensed up for a moment, unsure what one was supposed to do in situations such as this one. After a pause, which she thankfully disregarded, he put his arms around her, letting them tighten around her when the cries got louder. It absolutely broke his heart to see her like this, stone though it may be.

"How long can we stay like this, Lucius?" she asked, finally managing to choke out a few words, "the world is going to hell around us."

"We can stay here as long as we need to." he reassured.

"I miss Harry, and I miss my parents. I don't even know if he's still alive, I mean...he's been on his own for months now, what if something's happened?" she said, "And my parents," she hiccuped over another sob, "my parents don't even know I exist. They're safe, but they aren't my parents anymore."

Lucius didn't ask what she meant, he'd already found out what she'd done to her parents to keep them safe. A pang of jealousy hit him when she mentioned Potter, although he pushed it back rather quickly. Even if they were involved, which she claimed they weren't, it couldn't be anything at all to him.

She seemed to be settling down, but he continued to stroke her hair, holding her close to him. He didn't want to let her go, but when he heard her breathing even out, he conceded he should go back to his room. He began to pull away from her, trying to shift her back onto her pillow without waking her. He failed.

Her eyes opened, and her fist gripped loosely at his shirt. "Please, stay, Lucius." He looked at her, not knowing what to say.

He'd imagined staying in her bed before, though not because of the innocent reasons she was pleading with him for at the moment. He wanted to feel her body against his in a much different way than he had tonight, kiss every inch of her until she begged for something completely different than she did now. He wanted to undress her, kiss her...fuck her, though the word itself sounded vulgar. He wanted to hear his name fall from her lips in reverence and love, and he hated himself for it. The girl deserved better than this.

He hated himself for that thought as well. How was it that after less than a year with her, he'd managed to disregard everything he'd spent his life believing. How was it that after less than a year, he could respect a mudblood enough to hold back, enough to be her friend. To be what she needed him to be, rather than demand from her what he wanted. Abraxas would be turning over in his grave.

With a sigh, he shifted his weight to lay next to her on the bed, pointedly remaining outside of the blanket, and let her curl up into his side like she did when they sat by the fire. She fell back asleep within minutes, leaving him to ponder his own demons. It was a very long night.

* * *

 **September 19, 1998**

"Happy Birthday, Hermione." she muttered to herself, hearing the rain pounding on the roof before she even opened her eyes.

She was feeling increasingly uncomfortable with staying holed up in the cabin as time went on. She could tell herself she was doing research, but she wasn't getting anywhere alone. Her birthday was just an extra reminder, on top of the rapidly cooling fall air, that it was over a year since she'd gone on the run with Harry and Ron. She needed Harry back, she needed to be able to run through things with her best friend.

He would have a fit if she told him about her...developing...feelings for Lucius. He'd be impressed with the cabin they made. He'd have remembered her birthday, made some sort of tacky, sweet gesture to celebrate it. She missed Harry, Ginny, her parents. Ronald too, although her memories of him were tainted by the last few months she'd spent with him on the run. The whining, the pushiness, the anger he'd taken out on her, culminating in his abandonment. She couldn't forgive him for it. Not just yet.

Digging through her bag, she pulled out some fresh clothes and a towel. She could at least enjoy the luxury of a hot bath this morning, not that it was something she deprived herself of often. She loved magic.

Half an hour later, she reluctantly made her way out of her bedroom to the kitchen, eyeing her breakfast squirrel meat with some contempt. She never thought she would miss rabbit and deer, but there it was. Food was food, though, she thought as she shovelled it into her mouth.

She stood at the counter, looking wistfully outside. The rain was, quite pretty, even as it turned the ground to mud and filled the fire pit.

"Already had breakfast?" she asked Lucius, when the creaky floor and clicking sound of his cane alerted her of his presence in the kitchen. He walked up to the counter, standing just near enough for her to feel the warmth from him without actually touching her.

"A few hours ago." he said, looking out at the assortments of newly formed lakes surrounding their cabin.

Hermione leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. She didn't need to ask why he was up so early. The silencing spells around his room were a tell, and he'd admitted, once, that he carried his fair share of nightmares over the things he'd seen and done over the course of his career as a Death Eater. She didn't ask what they were, and he didn't offer to share. It felt as though he was trying to protect her from the realities of what was happening.

She appreciated it, sometimes she hoped she never found out what haunted him, afraid that if she knew she could never fully forgive him. Days like this one though, when she saw him looking like this the next morning, with glamour charms concealing the redness of his eyes and the obvious signs that he'd been awake for most of the night, she wanted to shake him and beg him to let her be there for him.

She felt his arm go around her, and he leaned his face into her hair, "Happy Birthday." he said, surprising her. She smiled, and felt her heart beat faster when his hand lifted to her neck, caressing her skin as he brushed her hair out of the way and fastened something around it, before letting it fall back to her waist.

She looked down at the pendant, smiling at the sight. He'd carved it, she realized. It was an obvious choice of a gift, an otter for her patronus. Not perfect, by any stretch of the imagination. Her mother's father was a woodworker by trade, and she'd seen enough of his craft to recognize the flaws in Lucius's. Despite that, Lucius's was undeniably good, and she had a slight suspicion (which she would never voice to him) that he'd cheated by use of magic. It was such a sincere gesture it made her heart ache. Turning towards him, she wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest.

It was the first time she was willing to admit she might be falling in love with the man. She had no idea what to do with the fact, or what to do with the entire concept. Ignore it, fight it, pretend she never had the realization to begin with.

She knew he was still conflicted, on some subconscious level, over her blood status. It didn't bother her anymore, well...it did, but she tried not to let it. All it would take was time. It wasn't her place to beat his prejudices out of him, it was painful enough to be on the receiving end of them without setting herself up for failure by trying to make him see reason. He had to do that himself, and he was. She would be proud of him, in some sick, twisted way, for slowly coming to the same conclusion that thousands of witches and wizards had before him.

Maybe then, she thought, maybe then she could hate herself just a little less over how she felt.

 **Thanks for reading/following/favouriting, and especially reviewing! I really love hearing your feedback :)**

 **I'd initially intended to post all of 'A Semblance of a Life' as one chapter, but as I was proof reading it before posting it, I realized I'd missed a month. So here is the rest of this chapter! I hope you enjoyed, and that you're ready for things to start moving forward a little more next chapter...**


	8. Regret

**So first of all: thank you for your reviews :) I really do appreciate reading your opinions. Also, for being patient with me for an update...exams are finally over, so I can write again guilt free...even if I'm completely fried after the semester.**

 **Second: I have so many reservations about this chapter. Amongst them is that I don't watch horror movies and barely managed not to faint in first aid class...needless to say anything even mildly graphic in that sense is a challenge to write. How it turned out, I have no idea.**

 **To the guest reviewer who pointed out the patronus thing: I actually assumed the trio weren't able to cast the talking patronus spell, stemming mainly from the fact that Ron had to use the deluminator to find them after he left. I went back and looked through the book, and Hermione does claim that she thinks she can cast it, but its never made explicit that she does...so for the sake of closing off a gaping hole in my story I'll assume she can't and is overestimating her skills with that comment (even if, now that I think about it, it's almost absurd to think she can't...)**

 **To the guest reviewer who asked about how they'd avoided detection for so long: I actually need to edit the first chapter, because I have Draco apparate to the Manor alone at the beginning...and I'm not entirely sure why I did that. Snape side-along apparates him. Otherwise, I'll fill in more about how they managed to hide, and revisit why he couldn't escape with Narcissa and Draco as the story progresses.**

 **I hope that, despite the many issues with this story, it's a somewhat enjoyable read. Please continue to give me feedback!**

 ** _October 20th, 1998_**

" _Eric Vargas, Evelyn Vargas, Tammy Edwards, Sean Bishop, Terry Baldwin, Kristi Soto, Miranda Brown, Charles Brown, Lavender Brown, Chelsea Brown,_ "

Her breath hitched at the last name read. Snapping out of her daze, she slammed the power button on the radio, cutting the list short. That damn list seemed to get longer every day. She might never have liked Lavender Brown, the girl had been a vapid gossip, but it didn't prevent the tears from slipping down her face for her former roommate. She might not have liked the girl, but Lavender was brave, noble, loyal. She was a true Gryffindor in every sense of the word. She _should_ have lived. Her little sister wasn't even Hogwarts aged and they'd killed her along with the rest. They'd murdered the little girl.

There was no mercy, no end to the horror she listened to. She knew why she tortured herself with the radio. She knew she would continue listening to PotterWatch day after day, hearing more bad news with slowly dying hope, but she wanted nothing more, in that minute, than to incinerate the messenger.

It was dark outside, and wiping away at a few more angry tears, she walked back into the cottage. She didn't think she could sleep alone that night, so made her way to Lucius's room and knocked, pushing the door back without waiting for an answer - too tired to care if she was intruding on his privacy, and too upset to think twice about her actions. His wand was in his hand in an instant, lighting the room with a lumos. Seeing the tear tracks staining her cheeks, he moved over and pulled the covers open for her to slip under.

"Who was it?" he asked, softly, his voice carrying a certain compassionate, human quality that one could safely bet few people had ever heard from him.

"Lavender Brown and her family." she answered, hearing her voice crack again, "her parents, and even her little sister." Hermione choked on another sob.

Lucius shifted slightly, uncomfortably, pulling the blanket up and tucking it in around her neck, making an effort to keep the cabin's chilly autumn air away from her. He never knew why she came to him, but every time she did, he provided what pitiful comfort he could. At the very least making certain she was warm while she cried herself to sleep.

In fact, he waited night after night for her to recollect that he was one of those monsters she feared, too. The ones who'd killed families in the name of a peaceful pureblood society. Sometimes, he wondered if she was deluding herself into thinking he hadn't been; that defying all logic, she thought that he'd risen into the position of the Dark Lord's right hand man during the first war without getting his hands dirty. If that was the case, a large part of him didn't want her to ever find out the truth.

* * *

Hermione rubbed her eyes the next morning. She'd had an awful night, waking up four or five times throughout the course of it. Now, as a result, her head hurt and her eyes were practically cemented shut with dried tears. Lucius was still asleep, an arm slung across her waist. It felt nice to wake up with him, she felt safe. She also felt loved, regardless of whether or not she actually was. She took his hand in hers, turning it over and examining it for a moment before pulling his arm tighter around her. It was the first time she'd woken up with him still in the bed. Usually, he was long gone by the time her eyes opened, his side of the bed completely cold.

She nestled closer to him, his warmth contrasting in the best way with the cold air filtering into the room from a partially opened window. Fall was really settling in, the northern wind whistling past their cabin, shaking the trees. She turned herself around, a feat surprisingly difficult while caught in the tangle of blankets and underneath Lucius's arm.

His hair was splayed out on the pillow, and his features were relaxed. He still looked like he'd been to hell and back. His time in Azkaban, maybe, or when he was reduced to a prisoner in his own home. Whatever had happened to him then had changed him, and it went beyond carving lines into his face and poorly healed physical injuries. She traced the outline of his jaw with her hand, stubble scratching at her palm. He was still an attractive man, despite it all; maybe, in the non-physical sense, because of it all. She sighed, unsure where she was taking that thought, and pressed her face into his chest.

It was easier to shove her feelings to the back of her mind in a cold bed, she was now beginning to realize. Her hand, seemingly of its own accord, traced patterns on his chest. The thought that she should stop and crawl out of bed before he woke crossed her mind, but she was far too comfortable to act on it. She closed her eyes and tried to quell her overactive imagination so that she could enjoy a few more hours of sleep. It was too grey outside to know how far up the sun was, but she could make a pretty good guess that it wasn't much past four or five in the morning.

After what felt like an eternity of shuffling around and her brain failing to convince her body to go back to sleep, she opened her eyes again and gave up. This time, she picked up Lucius's hand, tracing the lines of his palm and the length of his fingers, pressing them against her own. It was all too easy to conjure up memories of what his hands felt like, stroking her face, her arms, the curve of her back. Soft and warm, although never anything but innocuous touches.

She could vividly imagine more. They could start by dropping from her cheekbones to her neck, then twining into her hair. Of course, he would kiss her then, and she would feel his hot breath as he followed them down. Maybe he'd let go, tracing the length of her arms, once, while he looked at her, his piercing grey eyes raking over her body. His hands would move in from there, ghosting across her stomach. They'd slide up, cupping her breasts, squeezing.

The daydream ended abruptly when he shifted in his sleep, exposing the brand on his arm. She stilled, sucking in breath. Suddenly, the cold didn't seem all that forbidding.

Fear of Lucius and fear of herself were both strong motivators, so moments later she was trudging back to her room to grab a sweater and then stepping outside. Hermione pulled her hands into the sleeves, wrapping her arms around herself, trying to take a calming breath. When that failed, she walked down to the riverbank and sat.

She was, once again, painfully aware of all the reasons reason objected to her emotions.

" _And you must be… Miss Granger. Yes, Draco's told me all about you… and your parents. Muggles, aren't they?"_

 _Enemies of the heir beware._ The confrontation in the book shop was absolutely nothing to the terror she'd felt that year. She'd tried to put on a brave front for Harry and Ron, not to mention she hardly wanted the Slytherins to harass her anymore than they already were. Whether or not she succeeded was completely besides the point; the sleepless nights wondering if there would be a death, terrified that _she_ would be the death, culminating in wandering the hallways with only a mirror to defend herself from a basilisk. To say she'd felt unequipped to deal with the danger was vastly underestimating her emotions.

It wasn't something she talked about. _Ever_. Ginny had enough guilt piled onto her from the incident without her making it worse, but she could still picture every detail of the piercing yellow eyes that sent her to the hospital wing, petrified. She would have died that night, if she didn't have the mirror with her. What kind of man was capable of setting that monster loose on a group of children. _He'd changed_ , part of her argued. Did people really change though? Perhaps he no longer wanted to set a Basilisk loose in a school, but he'd certainly proved that he was _capable_ of doing so.

" _It's time you learned the difference between life and dreams, Potter. Now give me the prophecy, or we start using wands."_

She could still hear Lucius's threatening voice in the department of mysteries. She remembered running for her life from the group of them, remembered Dolohov slashing his wand and watching purple light coming at her too quickly to do anything except think that that was how she was going to die.

She hadn't, but the pain when she woke and the wide assortment of potions she'd taken for months were more reminders of that night. The department of mysteries began to mingle with the basilisk in her nightmares, and never had she seen Lucius as anything but the villain. She closed her eyes again, trying to free herself of the memories.

"Hermione?" a voice called out from behind, and she heard Lucius's footsteps approaching. She didn't respond, just kept sitting, staring out into the distance. Her stomach clenched uncomfortably, turning over at the sound of his voice. When had she forgotten who he was, what he'd done? He was a Death Eater, forced to leave by circumstances, but a Death Eater nonetheless. That mark was a part of him whether he'd changed or not. _How had she forgotten that?_

He sat down, next to her under the tree, casting a spell to keep the rain off of them. She looked up, startled. When had it started to rain? She felt like she was losing her mind, completely losing her grasp on reality.

For a long time, he didn't say anything. Well aware he was waiting for her to open, Hermione still opted to keep silent. She didn't trust herself to say anything she wouldn't regret.

It was her that broke the silence, although not in any deliberate way. Her stomach had been protesting her decision to pass up on her usual scraps of squirrel meat that morning, and finally, it was loud enough to reach Lucius's hearing. He offered a small smile, and struggled to his feet.

"You need to eat." he said, a hint of concern on his face. She looked up at him from where she still sat, about to tell him she was fine. Her eyes dropped to his hand, held out to help her up. This was why she forgot, a voice chimed. Sighing, she took it, and started the short walk back at his side.

Their silence was, again, unexpectedly interrupted. It was a far less benign interruption than the last, and far less predictable. After months of hiding in complete isolation, they were no longer isolated. The pair stopped walking, staring out past their wards, their hearts pounding.

Lucius's arm went around her shoulder as he tried to direct her back into the cabin. There was no use watching the distasteful scene, and it was too dangerous for either of them to risk being seen. They were too recognizable, too distinct. As it was, they should still be apparating to a new location, although he was at a loss as to where that could be. If the snatchers had made it _here_...there was absolutely nowhere safe.

When Hermione looked up at Lucius, she knew there would be no reasoning with him. He wouldn't budge on the subject. He was distracted though, and this could be her only chance. She felt herself tear up as she pronounced the words, but she would not leave her classmates to their fate, not when she'd seen the way he got when asked what happened to the muggle-borns at the ministry.

She looked at Lucius, where he stood, frozen by her petrificus totalus, his eyes giving away his feelings of betrayal. "I'm sorry," she said, turning on her heels and rushing out to help the Creevey brothers.

* * *

Collin had never once in his short life been more relieved than when he saw Hermione Granger stepping out of nowhere, suddenly shooting off curses towards the snatchers. She was alive! They would live, too. His relief, however, was short lived. Moments after she evened out their odds, Dennis went down. Distracted, and forgetting all about Moody's slogan 'constant vigilance', another snatcher hit him with an incarcerous. Hermione was now defending, three against one while he could only watch.

She shot stunning curse after stunning curse, clearly out of breath and out of ideas. With a cry of desperation, she cast something he didn't recognize, before diving into the mud behind a fallen tree. The snatcher who was hit fell back, he screamed in pain, as her curse cut straight through his shield, slashing him across the chest. Collin felt queasy as the man's shirt turned red, but Hermione didn't spare him another glance, too busy dodging curses from the remaining two. Her eyes were wide and wild, and more than anything else, they were terrified. He wasn't sure if it was a result of her actions, or the realization that she was going to lose.

Only moments after she'd landed the curse, she was hit with a spell he didn't recognized. It seemed to slow her down, but she didn't stop fighting, instead renewing her onslaught with still more desperation. Panic, and possibly pain, slowed her down. A stunning hex just missed her adversary, and, moments later, she was hit again, this time with an incarcerous.

Collin's stomach dropped. It was over, the three of them would be turned over to the ministry, and he didn't even want to think what would happen to Hermione, still undesirable number two, thought to be in hiding with Harry Potter himself. He looked towards his brother, who hadn't moved from the spot he collapsed moments before. The snatchers were making no efforts to bind him, and he felt another cold wave of fear wash over him. The possibility that Dennis _hadn't_ been stunned suddenly seemed too real.

"You fucking bitch!" the one women shrieked running to her with her wand pointed out. The second woman ran over to the body of their deceased companion, crying. Hermione looked pained at the scene, but then turned her gaze back to the woman currently threatening her, a mixture of emotions splayed across her face, still not saying a word.

"You killed him! _You killed my brother_." the snatcher cried again, kicking her stomach, "filthy, savage, _mudblood._ " the woman hissed.

"Crucio" the woman enunciated the curse quite clearly, and in the off chance one hadn't heard the spell, the red light shooting out of her wand and Hermione's subsequent scream left an observer in no doubt. A second round of the curse hit her after the first subsided, and the pure, wholehearted rage felt by the woman went into the spell, fueling it even more than in the first.

"Stop!" Collin couldn't even recognize his voice as it was ripped out of him, "Please, God, _please stop_ …" he begged. No one seemed to pay him any mind to him.

There was a lull and Hermione, who laid still, trussed up, in the mud, was silent. Collin prayed to any merciful deity watching that she'd fallen unconscious. A quiet whimper cutting through the forest disabused him of that hope. He watched as the woman straddled her, unsheathing a dagger, and shoving up Hermione's sleeve.

"This way," she said, biting her tongue for a moment as she carved the first three letters into Hermione's arm, "everyone will know just what kind of trash you are."

Collin couldn't see what was happening, the snatcher's back blocking his view, but he could come up with a thorough enough picture. He looked over to his brother's motionless form, selfishly wishing he would wake up, and trying to convince himself it was for the best that he didn't have to witness this. He could still hear himself crying, yelling.

When he thought things couldn't get worse, he saw Lucius Malfoy step out of the emptiness, raising his wand and throwing the killing curse at the woman mourning the other snatcher's loss. It didn't even occur to him to wonder what the man was doing here, considering he'd apparently been murdered by muggle-borns many months earlier. His footsteps, as he trudged across the mucky forest floor, were far from quiet, and if the one carving up Hermione had been paying any attention to her surroundings, to _anything_ but her own grief and the girl she was taking it out on, she would have heard him coming.

Malfoy grabbed her hair, yanking it back and ripping her off of Hermione. Before she could react appropriately, he held both her wand and dagger. He dropped the wand, stepping on it. With a horrible crunching noise, it snapped in two.

"Please," she begged, her voice suddenly desperate, terrified, and _sad_ as the situation fully dawned on her. Whatever murderous rage fuelled her moments before was gone, and in place of the crazed woman extracting her revenge was the terrified shell of a girl, "please…don't kill me." she begged. "Please...I have a son. I can't leave him alone…"

"Please…" she continued to plead, silent tears beginning to fall down her cheeks, "I can't leave him…" She was looking at Lucius, _she was so sincere_. For a second, Collin saw Malfoy falter. His hand lowered the knife just a little. "She's just a mudblood…" the woman continued, seeing the same thing as Collin and desperately trying to pounce on the opportunity.

If Collin had blinked just then, he would have missed Lucius's next action. Swiftly, the man pulled her head back, and in one fluid motion, slit her throat. When he let go of her hair, the body lulled over, splashing mud, water, and blood onto Collin. The boy barely kept the bile rising in his throat down as he remained transfixed by the form of the woman lying on the ground, only a few feet from where he was tied up.

He couldn't look away, even with his head spinning at the sight. She was still alive, rapidly finding herself in a pool of blood pumped out from her by her own heart. It pulsed from her neck in the same gory, rhythmic motion he'd seen arterial wounds do in First Aid class. It was an arm in that video, and he remembered laughing at the poor effects and terrible acting. How he would give _anything_ for that to be the closest he ever got to the real thing. He felt another wave of nausea as a few last, ragged breaths were pulled from her. Very deliberately, Collin finally looked away. What he saw hardly left him with any more comfort.

Lucius was leaned over, his back to Collin, casting something on Hermione. He spoke quietly, removing the bindings, and Collin watched her nod emphatically through tears. For a moment, by the way his hand caressed her face, and the care he was showing her, it almost seemed to him as though the man could be an ally.

The look that was turned towards him moments after that thought crossed his mind promised a similar end to the one met by the woman. Collin felt any remaining blood drain from his face. They'd escaped the snatchers, but were now, instead, facing a potentially worse evil in the hands one of Voldemort's Death Eaters.

Malfoy turned back towards Hermione, picking her up with much more care than Collin thought was possible. The sleeve fell back to cover her arm, but she didn't even wince. This was Malfoy though, not even the harmless, cowardly Malfoy they'd gone to school with, it was Malfoy Sr, the one who'd taught him to spout the pureblood nonsense to begin with. When the man glanced in his direction and pointed his wand, Collin closed his eyes, waiting to be hit with the killing curse. Instead, he felt the magical binds keeping him in place drop.

Malfoy didn't look back, and he stepped through some sort of magical barrier, disappearing with Hermione.

* * *

Lucius barely spared the boy another thought, though he did ensure to drop the wards sufficiently that should they choose to follow them, the pair, _and them alone_ , would get through free of injury.

He was focused on Hermione, who was drifting in and out of consciousness. With no idea what spell she was hit with before the cruciatus, he could only relive the memory of watching, frozen and helpless, from inside the wards, while she was taken down. Incompetents, he couldn't help but sneer, recollecting the ease with which the boys went down. She could have won the duel in a heartbeat if they'd even managed to slow one of them down.

He searched for a visible mark on her, a wound he could heal, hoping that is was as simple as external damage. "Hermione," he whispered, his voice hoarse with desperation, "Hermione, you need to tell me where it hurts. Do you know what you were hit with?"

"Stomach," she hissed, finally allowing herself to let out an agonized cry. She flinched when he touched her, pulling up her shirt. There was nothing visible. His breath hitched, as he desperately tried to recall what he could of healing spells. He'd never been known for his competence with them, despite the value they could obviously have to someone in his position.

She let out another cry, and he cursed under his breath. "I'm sorry," he said, digging through her potions stock for something that might counter the effects of an unknown curse. He didn't dare give her pain potion yet, he needed to know if she took a turn for the worse, and negating it wouldn't actually reverse the injury. "I'm so sorry," he said, again, as she cried out a third time, curling in on herself.

His eyes fell back to one particular potion. His gut feeling told him there was a chance it would work, and at this point, he couldn't afford not to take it. Tipping back her head, he made her swallow it in its entirety. His concern escalated when nothing seemed to happen, he held her hand, wincing when she clamped down on it, channeling her pain into her grip.

"Never do that to me again," he said, his voice raw with something. Hermione didn't answer, closing her eyes as another wave of pain hit her. "I thought..." he swallowed hard, "I was so afraid."

"Lucius…" Hermione looked at him, fully aware how rare it was for him to let emotion colour his words.

Whatever she might have followed with was lost. Footsteps from the the two boys whom he'd momentarily forgotten could be heard as they clamoured through the cabin. Lucius looked towards them, and was unsure what reaction to put forward. Both of them were haphazardly holding their wands out, apparently torn between defending from him, and defending from something unknown behind them.

"What?" he hissed at them.

Lucius considered, yet again, finishing the snatcher's job himself. He cursed himself for allowing them through the wards, and could only blame temporary insanity brought on by fear. He raised his wand towards them, pressing his lips together to keep himself from uttering the first and only curse currently coming to mind.

"Collin, Dennis…" Hermione said, shifting slightly towards them. Lucius noted that she at least she seemed lucid. "...tell us…"

Still mistrustful, though, frankly, with good reason, Dennis and Collin caught each other's eye, glancing towards Lucius, then back towards the door. Before they made up their mind to spit out whatever it was that had them running inside, a blast shook the cabin.

"Tell me what that was." Lucius commanded. Collin looked at the man, his chin raised defiantly.

"We don't have time for this." Dennis muttered, looking between Hermione and Lucius one more time, apparently making his mind up about something. "There's snatchers outside. And Death Eaters...they're trying to take down the wards."

Hermione narrowed her eyes at the boys for a moment. They'd spent months strengthening those wards, and, to her knowledge, the three snatchers that saw her step out were no longer in a position to give away their cabin's location. Unless someone were to literally walk into the walls, they should be next to impossible to detect. In addition, should someone be fortunate enough to find them, they would not be in any health to try and take them down. In fact, it was only after several muggle repelling charms, which Lucius cryptically claimed were unnecessary, that she even allowed him to place that particular spell on their surroundings.

It hit her in one horrifying realization how they were found. _Dennis was underage_. Dennis had the bloody trace on him, and the ministry _knew_ where he was. It was a cold day in hell, because she thought, even if only for an instant, that maybe she should have let Lucius direct her back into the cabin rather than try and provide assistance.

"Dennis is underage." she said, for Lucius's benefit. If the Creevey brothers had survived this long, doubtless they were well aware of the dangers of performing magic around him. Her arm was throbbing, she felt like someone had gutted her and tried to shove her entrails back in, but in that moment it paled to her anger. It wasn't entirely fair to blame the brothers, but she did. How dare they endanger them by coming into the wards, knowing that the ministry would identify his, and by extension, their location.

Lucius took hold of her arm, grabbing the pouch he'd been digging through moments before. He was about to apparate them away. Hermione didn't entirely disagree with his train of thought, until she cast what had meant to be a final look at the Creevey brothers. Right then, something in her shattered.


	9. Trust

**Sorry I left the story sitting so long with a cliffhanger! Honestly, I've been a bit exhausted.**

 **As usual, I'd love to hear feedback! I love reading your reviews, thank you so much for taking the time to leave them.**

"Lucius," Hermione hissed, pulling her arm away, "we can't…" she closed her eyes, just for a moment. An inexplicable drowsiness was taking over, at the worst possible time, begging her to rest. Her common sense screamed back, fighting her body to stay awake, _now was not the time_. She snapped her eyes open, momentarily alert.

"So," Collin asked, still looking at her like she had all the answers, "what's the plan?" The boy was practically vibrating where he stood, partially from the adrenaline, partially from the fear. She didn't answer, unsure how to break it to him that there was no plan.

"What's _he_ doing here, anyways?" Dennis continued.

"Where's Harry?" Collin asked again. She found it strangely comforting to see that some things didn't change. She'd lost count of how many times he'd asked her that question back when they were still at Hogwarts. Unfortunately, it was a very shallow comfort since this time she had absolutely no idea what the answer was.

Lucius was scowling at her. _Damn, he was angry_. More than angry, his eyes were steely and cold, devoid of any of the concern and care she'd been privy to only a few minutes ago. He stood abruptly, walking towards the door. Hermione winced when it slammed shut.

"Why was he so angry? Why _isn't_ he trying to kill us?" Dennis asked, piercing the silence. "I don't understand." the younger boy continued, "Are you alright?"

She was barely aware by the last question, not that she would have had time to answer any of them at the rate they were being asked. Instead, her stomach twisted with a different kind of pain than she'd already been feeling. Abandonment. _Again_.

She'd spent months surprised every time she saw his pale, pointed face the day after an argument. She waited for him to decide it was no longer worth putting up with her, even if it meant starting over elsewhere. Her best friend had left. Ron, who'd stood by her and Harry through thick and thin, fought alongside them as they faced one obstacle after another, had left.

"I thought she was supposed to be hiding out with Harry." a voice whispered, loudly, in the background.

" _Shut up, Dennis_." Another hissed back, "Why is she falling asleep?"

There had been petty fights during their childhood, over Harry's firebolt, Crookshanks and Scabbers (back when they still believed he was a rat), but he'd always been there in the end. If even _Ron_ left her when she needed him, there seemed to be little that would hold a forty-something ex-Death Eater back from doing the same. Why had she let herself trust Lucius to stay?

Her face was already wet, from mud, blood and tears, so there was little point to wiping the fresh ones away. Instead she let them fall, studiously avoiding making eye contact with either of the new arrivals who were, still, waiting for her to say something. She'd told Lucius they couldn't leave without them, but she had no plan on how she could leave _with_ them. She wondered if Dennis even knew how to apparate, if _Collin_ even knew how to apparate, considering the timing of the ministry's fall. One of them, at least, had to since they'd wound up here.

"Why is she crying?" Dennis asked, sounding a little lost.

" _Other_ than because we're surrounded by snatchers and Death Eaters?" Collin answered, his voice betraying more tension than his younger brother expected.

Her head was spinning, and despite the desperate situation, her eyelids felt so heavy. She allowed them to shut. _Just for a second_.

" _Damn_." she heard footsteps rushing towards her, "you need to stay conscious until we get out of this." It was Lucius's voice this time, but he was gone; she'd seen him leave the cabin.

Her eyes snapped open again, confirming it really was him. She smiled, despite everything, closing them again. He hadn't left her.

* * *

Lucius cursed himself for allowing the wards to drop for the boys, who were whispering to each other and casting him and Hermione an assortment of suspicious looks. Putting up with an enraged Hermione at a later time would have been more than a fair price to avoid the situation they were in. He wondered why he was urging her to stay conscious, if she wasn't he could apparate her away without worry that she would resist. It might be foolish to try and get out with _them_ in tow, but there was no doubt she would be splinched if he apparated her while she fought him. She'd be out of danger - she'd be dead.

The two mudblood boys were the ones the snatchers were after. He'd gone outside to check how long the four of them had before the wards came down, half expecting they'd already be breached. It was a relief to see the 'Death Eaters' which they'd referred to had been, in fact, only two Death Eaters. Thorfinn Rowle and Theodore Nott. The former was a thug, best known for shooting off Avadas' at anything that moved, while the later was a newly branded Death Eater, who'd failed eight out of his ten NEWTs, only managing an acceptable in Dark Arts and Transfiguration.

It had turned into a bit of a running joke between the older Death Eaters, that Nott Sr had managed to raise the boy to be even more useless than himself. Even in his disgrace, it was something Lucius had taken a certain amount of pleasure from. Theodore didn't appear to know when he was insulted, and was stupid enough to rival even Crabbe and Goyle's offspring. The result was that he'd been partnered with Thorfinn, and the two were left to chase unpromising leads from the ministry's Muggle Born Registration Committee with no expectations of ever accomplishing anything.

Their presence was _good_. The ministry had absolutely no idea who they'd 'cornered' behind the wards. The group of them would break through eventually, it was inevitable considering the amount of magic they were being pounded with, but they had more time than what he'd expected. At least a few minutes to get away from this place.

He had taken the potion Hermione ingested a few times in the past, when hit with one curse or another. It was the only reason he recognized the thing. He'd been adept enough at school, but any knowledge he'd acquired from Slughorn had long since been forgotten. His current repertoire extended as far as an assortment of poisons, common household potions, veritaserum, dittany, and this one, whose name evaded him, but which was easily recognized by its characteristic foul smell. In addition to its taste and odour, he was rather well acquainted with its side effects, dizziness, nausea, and, most troubling at the moment, drowsiness.

It wasn't the sort of drowsiness you could fight off, either, it was a magically induced sleep. The fact that she was still awake, sort of, had to be a testament to her stubbornness. He looked at the boys again, the bigger one seemed to be constantly teetering on the edge of saying something to him, but then thinking the better of it. He might be amused, if he still wasn't wishing the snatchers had managed to kill them.

The younger one appeared slightly less mistrustful, and so he tossed him Hermione's bag. "She needs invigoration draught and pain relief." with a curt nod, the boy began to search through it. He turned to the older one, "How did you hide this long?"

Collin, as he would learn the boy was called, glared at him. "What's it to you?" he hissed.

Lucius examined at him carefully, annoyed that the boy had been eager to follow Hermione's every whim, but was practically refusing to speak to him. There wasn't time for this. He was so close, too close, to losing his temper and doing something he would regret. _Might_ regret.

"Because," he said, gritting his teeth and taking the offered potions from the younger boy, "Hermione thinks that your life is worth something."

He didn't agree. The rush of hatred and disgust for them, in which he had whole heartedly believed his whole life, came back with a vengeance in their presence and current circumstances. Filthy _mudbloods_. This horrible situation they were in; _it was their fault_ , it always was. The wards were struck again, and, as before, the power of the spell moved the ground they stood on and the cabin with it.

Gently, terrified he'd hurt her more, he shook Hermione's shoulder, watching her eyes snap open again. "Pain relief," he said, helping guide the potion to her mouth.

He nearly dropped it when the cabin renewed its reverberating only moments after. Fear drained the remaining colour from his face. They needed to leave _now_.

"We hid in the muggle world." one of them offered while Hermione drank from the second bottle.

"Of course you did." he let out in a breath, attempting to quiet his resentment over that particular answer.

He hated muggles, hated their uselessness and their weakness. That he'd ever acknowledged to himself they might not all be bad...well _that_ was completely besides the point. Now, he was reduced to considering pretending to be one.

 _It's their fault._ His hand tightened around his wand, just for a moment, until he pictured Hermione's stricken face when she heard that awful list and cried, coming to him for comfort. Lucius knew she would cry over these boys as well, whether he killed them or just left them on their own, but she would be nowhere near him when she did so. Injured or not, if he went ahead with either of the more tempting courses of action, he would never see her again.

Lucius tried to catalogue all he knew about muggles, it wasn't much, considering his entire life had been spent trying to know as little about them as possible. Pictures that didn't move, houses that weren't warded, metal boxes that rolled for transportation, trains. _Trains_. Those, he almost understood.

He looked at the older boy, whose stubbornness might just be the death of them. "No one is keeping you here."

"We aren't leaving you alone with Hermione." the bigger one puffed out his chest.

He heard her suck in a breath, but cut her off before she could answer the implied accusation to him. "If you want to help her, then _be helpful_." he spat out, stopping himself short of saying anything else.

Behind their words and attempts to paint themselves as brave, the two were lost, confused, and terrified. Half starved and exhausted could also be added to the list. They were scared for their friend, scared of him, and scared of the situation. Looking at them again, he saw why she'd pulled away, refused to abandon them. They were so young. They should be tucked away at Hogwarts, learning how to create a shield spell to block bat-bogey hexes, not running for their lives. _They're only mudbloods._

' _She's just a Mudblood'_ he heard the snatcher's voice, and his hand reached out to Hermione's face, wiping off the blood mingled with drying mud on her cheek. He felt sick, though he couldn't begin to fathom _why_.

Her words from the first day he'd spent with her, when she'd saved him out of misplaced pity, came back to twist a knife in his gut.

' _You fought for this, Malfoy. Twice. You fought to eradicate muggle-borns from the wizarding world. You're getting exactly what you wanted so don't you dare, for even an instant, pretend you're any better than that woman!'_

 _His fault_. How much of it was, he would probably never know. How much had the Malfoy influence helped create the regime terrorizing the wizarding world? The regime which caused her current state. _It's the mudbloods' fault_ , he thought again.

He'd introduced Severus to the Dark Lord, the man who'd ultimately killed Albus Dumbledore. He'd bribed, threatened, blackmailed, and otherwise manipulated countless ministry officials. Imperiused the ones who wouldn't see things the way they needed to, killed the ones who could be spared.

 _Trains_ , he reminded himself.

He didn't bother to ask if either of them could do human transfigurations. It was NEWT level material, and he'd seen them duelling. They were not NEWT level students. Another shudder to the cabin urged him to hurry.

He pulled out his wand, pointing it to Hermione. She stared at him, waiting for what he would do without demanding any sort of explanation. She trusted him, at least to an extent. He wondered how far that trust stretched when she wasn't drugged. He didn't deserve it. Merlin help him, but he did not deserve that look of absolute faith. _Was it alright to mix an invigoration draught, pain relief potion, and whatever that damned third one was?_ He had absolutely no idea. His hand was shaking. _Merlin, why was his hand shaking?_ He was too old for this.

He breathed in, out, counting and emptying his mind. There was no place for the terror he felt in his, admittedly terrible, half formed escape plan. Lucius muttered a string of incantations. Her hair straightened, shortened and lightened, and while anyone who knew her would recognize her, he counted on the fact that those hunting her _did not_ know her by anything except her wanted posters.

It was all he felt safe doing. Lucius wished he remembered if there were any negative effects to transfiguring an injured person. Probably, common sense screamed at him. He changed his own appearance next, growing a dark beard, matching his hair to it. He shortened himself, and cast a finite on his own clothing, which had, originally, been muggle clothes belonging to either Potter or Weasley...he never did ask. He'd lost enough weight from malnutrition over the last couple months that they fit. His stomach nearly revolted at the thought of being dressed like a muggle, but his mind reminded him that there were more important things to worry over.

The brothers were staring at the door, waiting for it to be blasted open any moment. Their own appearances still needed to be altered. He glanced to Hermione who, despite her potion induced haze, appeared to be aware of what was happening around her.

"We'll apparate to King's Cross station, and board a train. They'll trace us as far as the station, but we can lose them there." he looked more pointedly at the newcomers, "I presume one of you is capable of apparating?"

Collin gave a curt nod and a hissed out 'yes'. It caused Lucius breathed out in relief, either over the fact itself, or that they seemed to trust him enough in that moment not to fight him on the subject.

He aged them. It was a relatively simple spell, which had been cast by many a witch and wizard in their youth and eagerness to purchase firewhiskey. Only years later would they become aware that the only distributors who were fooled were those willing to be. It was an easy spell to identify if a person was looking for it, but he could only hope that the snatchers coming after them wouldn't be looking for something so stupid.

A look of alarm crossed their faces as their bodies shifted, and as their hairlines retreated and the lines on their faces became more pronounced. Maybe he should have warned them. _Asked them_. He couldn't really find it in himself to care all that much.

Before him there were now two sickly middle-aged men, with mousy grey hair, and a decidedly odd looking Hermione whose bleary eyed look and weak nod told him all he needed to know about her current state. Another few spells removed the remaining traces of the fight.

He expected carrying an unconscious woman would draw as much attention in the muggle world as it would in the wizarding one, and Lucius prayed that with the invigoration draught she'd be able to continue fighting the side effects long enough to be seated on the train. She looked precariously close to losing that fight, but the apparition would doubtless jolt her awake for at least a few more minutes.

* * *

Through the haze and her confusion, Hermione was very aware of Lucius's arm around her waist, his fingers almost digging into her ribs as he kept her upright and walking. She had no idea how he was able to support as much of her weight as he was, given the constant struggle she knew his knee gave him. He was stronger than she'd given him credit for.

Idly, she wondered if potions expired. If they did, well...her own were likely long bad. That knowledge gap felt like a strange omission of knowledge on her part, but it would explain the reason that the pain potion had done absolutely nothing of what it was promised to.

Still, despite the throbbing in her arm, the shredder that her core felt like it was being shoved through, and Lucius's flinch every time he took a step, they continued to towards platform three. Their train would leave the station in a mere thirty minutes, taking them to God only knew where. She could close her eyes and give in to sleep. That seemed to be the only thing that mattered at the moment, or at least the most important. She knew it wasn't.

The Creevey brothers were not far behind. That was what was important. She would beam at Lucius if she had the strength to. She shouldn't have thought the worst of him, Hermione admonished herself, he wasn't a bad man. She hadn't given him enough credit on that end either.

Altered as they were, the four appeared only as suspicious as the sight of a young woman pressed up tightly to the side of a much older man had to. There were, however, few people whose eyes didn't follow the shabby, strangely dressed men and women that had followed Dennis's trace to their location. She felt safe casting her own looks, her breath hitching when one of them looked straight at her.

Her worst fears were proven unfounded, in that moment, when his gaze glossed over her. He continued to scan the platform for the two teenage wizards he was on alert for. Her sigh of relief came moments before someone bumped her arm, causing her to let out a hiss of pain completely disproportionate to the strength of the hit. The man turned towards her, confused, until his face altered in recognition.

"Granger!" he stumbled backwards, " _Get the fuck out of here!_ "

"Why are _you_ he-" she started to ask the question, but stopped short of finishing the thought. There was only one reason Theodore Nott could be at a muggle train station, and it was not to find a quirky new way to travel.

"Don't look at me like that," he said, already starting to leave while she was dragged away by Lucius, "just…fuck off."

"Theo!" A larger wizard called from a few meters away. "we're leaving. This is a waste of time, those brats aren't worth the effort we're putting in to catch them."

"Sure," he said, walking to the man's side, "Let's go get a drink."

They disapparated on the spot, baffling several muggles in the vicinity. Quickly, _too quickly,_ Hermione thought, the muggle witnesses appeared to shake it off as some byproduct of too much caffeine and too little sleep.

Her heart pounding after the surprising encounter, she let herself be guided to the platform, onto the train, and then to a seat. Theo had either become a Death Eater or a snatcher, although her money was on the former. Now she had to reconcile her quiet Runes and Arithmancy partner, with whom she'd studied for years, as a Death Eater. She swallowed her resentment and decided she wouldn't cry. Not this time, and certainly not over this.

Hermione let herself slump against Lucius, expending her last bit of energy on a smile directed at Dennis and Collin. Their escape was almost too easy, but she could think about that later. For now she would be grateful, and give in to her body's urgent need for sleep.

* * *

 _October 21, 1998_

Severus Snape was watching him, again. Since graduation, while in the Headmaster's presence, Theo thought that this had happened far too many times. It felt uncomfortably like he was a bug, being examined in its last moments of life.

The first time he'd noticed, he was certain he was going to be hauled up in front of his new master, called to account for the reasons he'd sabotaged his NEWTs. Snape, who'd graded him with an Outstanding for six years, wasn't fooled by his incompetence act. The man had to know there was something more to it. Inexplicably, he continued to exist mostly undisturbed.

He'd been invisible to anyone who mattered for most of his life, but it had hit him in one astoundingly uncomfortable realization that if his NEWT scores were _good,_ things would be expected of him. He had no intention of following in Draco's footsteps, to be assigned to actual missions and eventually killed as a result, even if he was forced to get the mark. He wasn't about to start spouting equality trash, but he'd never particularly wanted to kill his study partner. Granger did have her uses when they worked together, and he was more than happy to live and let live.

At this meeting, as with the rest, he let his eyes glaze over and ears fall deaf. Theodore could say that he, from the very depth of his soul, did not give a shit what the Dark Lord was droning on about. He expected he would find himself dead for it one day, but if this was going to be the rest of his life, then his drive to make it a long one wasn't particularly powerful.

The meeting ended in a surprisingly dull manner. So much so that he barely noticed the hordes starting to scatter. He was happy to only be subjected to these on a bimonthly basis, being too unimportant to attend anything but the most general and receive anything but the vaguest information.

Theo tensed when someone clapped his arm, but his shoulders slumped again when he realized who it was. His partner at the ministry, and surprising friend.

"We need to get the fuck out of here." Thorfinn muttered, his eyes fixing in the distance.

Theo followed his line of sight to see Parkinson and Dolohov eyeing them with more amusement than was ever healthy. His own father was next to the pair, desperately trying to ingratiate himself in their little clique, like a desperate teenager, instead of the adult he was supposed to be.

It seemed he hoped that with Malfoy gone, his lifelong dream of being included in their group was attainable. He could have told his father it would never happen, if the man stopped to ask. They laughed at his father almost as much as they laughed at him. If that wasn't enough, one just had to consider that those two stuck by Malfoy, to an extent, even after he'd lost all favour. Theo had to admit it was an actual friendship, surprising as that was.

He hoped that the mudbloods, wherever they were, rallied themselves to take care of them now that they'd disposed of Lucius Malfoy. Had the opportunity presented itself on that one, he would have taken it himself.

Theo sneered, and his gaze wandered the crowd before falling back on Snape. That was another one he hoped the Order bastards would take out soon; he wasn't sure how much longer his nerves could deal with the constant threat of being brought in for questioning by the Dark Lord's right hand man.

"See you tomorrow." Theo muttered, not waiting for a response before apparating home.

"Theodore." Snape's voice called out, following a faint pop sound that signalled another apparition behind him.

"What?" he asked, continuing towards the house. His heart was pounding, the memories of seeing Granger at the station, with a man she assumed had to be some disguised version of Potter, swirled at the forefront of his thoughts. That was _definitely_ treason, and would, without a doubt, come out if he was called in to account for his other deception. He was absolutely fucked.

"I think it's time we address your NEWTs." responded his former Potions Professor.

"Right." Theodore swallowed hard, closing his eyes for a moment to try and regain his composure. With his breathing steadied, he turned to meet the man's eyes.


	10. Loyalty

**Hi! I know it's been a while since I've updated this...as I'm sure everyone understands, life gets pretty unpredictable sometimes. Thanks for continuing to read, follow, favourite, and review! I really do appreciate reading what you have to say :)**

 **Before reading this chapter: I'm very aware that some things are coming out of nowhere. I introduced Theo abruptly, and will introduce a few more characters and plot elements abruptly. I know it's clumsy on my part. I'd originally intended to take the story one way, and have since re plotted out the ending twice...hence a few plot holes, severe lack of foreshadowing, and lack of flow.**

 **I debated editing and reposting the earlier chapters as well, but since 1) this story desperately needs to be properly proofread when I'm not exhausted 2) I'll probably find more inconsistencies as time goes on and 3) I really want to focus on finishing the story before I get sucked into editing and get too discouraged...please bear with me (or wait until after I go through and edit the story to continue reading).**

"I'm not sure what you're expecting me to say, Sir." Theo said, almost proud of himself for keeping his voice from shaking.

"I would like to know why you failed your NEWTs," Snape answered.

It felt like the man could see right through him, but Theo didn't break eye contact. It would be a sure sign of weakness, even an admission of guilt.

"Like I told McGonagall, I had more important things to concern myself with than school." It didn't sound like a lie, though he supposed it actually wasn't. He did have more important things to concern himself with, even if that fact had nothing to do with failing his NEWTs. "I'm busy. Lots of…" he paused, trying not to cringe, "ministry leads to follow."

Snape snorted, "You don't follow ministry leads, Theodore, you drink. You sit in your Manor with Thorfinn Rowle and drink."

Theo knew he was on dangerous grounds now, there wasn't any hope that the man who killed Dumbledore would find sympathy for a traitor to the Dark Lord.

"Fine." he said, "I had a thrilling evening of sitting alone in the comfort of my home planned, and I would love to get on with it."

His fist was clenched to his side, while he desperately tried to ignore the pounding of his heart. He was going to die, this was it for him. He knew this was coming the minute Draco's death was announced, but shit he'd hoped he had more time. He hadn't realized until now how much he'd hoped that Potter, for all his incompetence, would luck out again and maybe trip into the Dark Lord with a sword, or cast a well timed expelliarmus and have everything somehow fall into place.

Snape's eyes widened, as though he'd read his thoughts. Theo felt a sharp pain in his head, and flinched, raising his hand to his temples. It took a second sharp pain for him to realize that it was Snape who was causing it. A horrifying thought crossed his mind. It was well known the the Dark Lord was a legilimens, but what about Snape? No one spoke of it, but that didn't mean... _fuck_. Theo was waiting for the Avada Kedavra that would end it all. He waited, but the flash of green light wasn't coming.

"Do _not_ look the Dark Lord in the eye, Nott." was Snape's parting wisdom, before he disappeared.

Theo waited well over an hour for him to come back and drag him in front of the Dark Lord, but then it dawned on him that the older Death Eater had no intentions of doing so. He was going to claim Potter as his prize, handing him over to the Dark Lord and attaining all the glory that went along with it. _Fuck, this was all his fault._

He apparated to the Rowle ancestral home...Thorfinn might have an idea. He snorted, wondering when he got so desperate he had to ask Thorfinn to _think_.

* * *

Lucius was woken that night when something hit his chest, _hard_. It took less than a second to sit up with his hand up and ready to curse anyone nearby, and it took barely a second more to realize that it was Hermione who had hit him. The girl was crying, her face soaked in tears while the rest of her thrashed wildly on the bed, attempting to protect herself from Merlin only knew what. He'd given the last of the dreamless sleep to the Creevey brothers, in part because they needed it, but mostly so they would be out of his way.

"Hermione," he said, quietly, attempting to reach her to shake her awake, "Hermione, wake up."

Her arm caught the side of his face, "Hermione." he said, much louder. Holding the arm that had struck him, he reached over to her shoulder with the other hand. "Please," he shook her again, "wake up."

He shook her another time, and finally her eyes flew open. With a loud gasping breath, she made to sit up, halting at the realization that there was still a considerable amount of pain associated with the action.

"You are alright, you're safe." Lucius said, reaching out and smoothing her hair back away from her face. Her skin felt icy under his hands. This wasn't the first nightmare she'd had since he'd known her, and it likely wouldn't be the last. It was, however, the worst one he'd witnessed. Now that the danger was averted, he moved closer to her.

"They're dead." she said, her voice wavering and small. There was almost a question in what she was saying.

"Yes," Lucius confirmed, desperately looking for something to add.

"It's my fault" she said, looking up at him. "I could have used a stunning spell, I could have just bound that man like he did Collin…"

"It wasn't meant to be a friendly duel," he sighed.

"I killed him." she added, in an even smaller voice.

Lucius didn't say anything else, she didn't need his confirmation. Instead he got out of bed and left the room. Once he stepped out, he let himself close his eyes and lean against the wall. Weak as it was, he fought the urge to sit on the floor in the corner of the room and, for the first time in years, let himself cry. He felt pathetic, useless. Squaring his shoulders, he walked towards the small sink outside the washroom.

Quickly, he filled one of the disgusting hotel cups with cold tap water. This was his fault, he should have kept her away from the skirmish, or at least have been at her side from the beginning of it. She shouldn't have to be going through this, the injuries, the remorse. He was well aware of just how painful the whole process could be. The cup full, he made his way back to the room, passing the futon where Collin and Dennis still slept soundly. Once he'd crossed the threshold of their room, closed the door behind him.

She shook her head when she saw the cup, and he placed it next to the muggle clock on the bedside table. He shuffled again, tucking his legs under the blanket, and pulled her into him. It was more to remind himself that she was still alive, still breathing, than anything else.

"She said he was her brother...didn't she?" Lucius didn't like hearing her like this. She sounded weak, and it just reminded him, yet again, how badly he seemed to fail everyone he came into contact with. "Do you think he was a good brother…"

Cold grey eyes met hers for a moment, before he quickly looked away. "It is not worth speculating on it now, it no longer matters." His voice sounded hard, even to his own ears.

"Shouldn't I speculate on it though? Isn't it my duty to have some idea how he _lived_ his life, since I took it away." Her voice wavered, but, otherwise, she was almost eerily calm.

"It isn't." Lucius said. "Have some water." Hermione didn't reply, just stared silently at the wall. He took that as agreement.

After guiding her into a seated position, he handed her the cup. As soon as he let go, it became apparent that that was a mistake. The cup dropped out of her hands, which continued to shake even without the object.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, closing her eyes and leaning her head back against the wall.

"Don't be." he answered, still finding he sounded as though he were devoid of any proper feeling. He didn't know what to say, how to make it better.

Her hands continued to shake, until Lucius came back again with the cup filled once more, and pressed it into them. He didn't let go this time, helping guide and steady her hands to bring it to her lips.

"Is there something wrong with me?" she asked after a little while.

"Why would you even ask that?" he replied, looking at her, searching for what prompted the question.

"I don't know." she answered, "I hate myself for what I did. I hoped I would kill him, and I did. He was a person...he had a life. Family, friends...people who will miss him." she babbled, "but I don't regret it, I can't even regret it." she broke down into renewed sobs. " _Why don't I regret it?_ " It felt like someone kicked her, yet again, to admit it. She didn't regret it, how could she when she considered the alternative, but every part of her, her mind, her heart, her very soul wished she hadn't.

She looked up at him, begging for an answer he couldn't give. Not really. "I am...one of the last people you should be asking that." he sighed, wondering if he could put into words what he wanted to say, "for what it's worth, I do not believe there's anything wrong with you."

He took the cup out of her hands, setting it down on the table, then reached over to her. Under his hands, her skin was still too cold. He tried to tell himself it wasn't _unnaturally_ so, but failed spectacularly.

Lucius didn't get anymore sleep that night, instead, alternated between pacing, and sitting next to the girl, wishing that he could will her better. He felt helpless, and useless, and so scared every time she drifted off into unconsciousness she wouldn't come back. If only he'd been a more competent healer. If only he'd been a better _friend_ , that she hadn't felt the need to petrify him.

It was wishful thinking to imagine there was some sort of cure all potion that would fix unknown spell damage. Whether because of the curse itself, the mixture of potions, apparition, overexertion or all the factors combined, she'd taken a turn for the worse. All he could do was press a wet towel to her forehead, trying to keep the fever under control while she drifted in and out of consciousness.

"It's cold." she said, pulling the thin hotel blanket closer to her, trying to keep as much of her body heat to herself as possible. Her fever appeared out of nowhere only a few hours after her nightmare, shooting up spectacularly. Lucius wondered if she was going to die, if it was his lifelong curse to fight his attachments to the bitter end, only to have them stripped away the moment he learned to care.

* * *

 _October 22, 1998_

Collin woke from the best sleep he'd experienced since Dumbledore's death, freezing when he remembered what led to it. Dennis was next to him, also beginning to wake. His eyes jutted around the room, wondering what Malfoy did with Hermione. He didn't know why they'd trusted him, he'd shown his true colours well enough once they arrived here. Hermione had to be imperiused, any doubt he'd had of that was gone.

A door opened, revealing Malfoy. Collin stared at him. He didn't know what to do, he couldn't use magic without getting in an even worse situation, but he couldn't just stay here. He'd rather die than compromise everything he believed in enough to go along with _that man_ even one more hour.

"Leave." Malfoy said.

Hearing him speak, after he'd had the nerve to force a sleeping potion down their throats the night before, set off Collin.

"What did you do to Hermione?" he asked, meeting the Death Eater's eyes. He almost gasped when he noticed how run down Malfoy looked. Had he been that bad the night before?

The older brother wasn't sure what he was expecting as an answer, against all odds, he supposed he expected an admission of guilt followed by the man slinking off into the shadows. Perhaps an angry rant, or a Snape-like set down. It was a product of his naivety that he wasn't at all prepared for what Lucius Malfoy really did do.

It took five steps for Malfoy to cross the distance between his door and the futon, where he grabbed Dennis by the arm, tightening his grip and pressing his wand into the boys throat when he tried to shake him off.

"You can't use magic." Collin said, his eyes widening, "the trace…"

"The trace…" Lucius mused, his eyes flicking between the two of them, "If he dies…I wonder what would happen. Would they pick up the magic used on him? It would be too fleeting, I think. I would be prepared to take the risk."

"You would have done it yesterday." Dennis said, trying to be brave, "if you could have. If you really wanted to kill us."

Collin shot him a glare, begging him to stop talking.

"Clever boy," Lucius drawled, "but I'm not sure you really believe that."

With all his strength, he shoved Dennis towards the door, "You are correct, that I would prefer you didn't die." he tossed him the remainder of Hermione's muggle money. He wouldn't be needing it, whatever compunction she felt to pay the muggles for a room and food was hardly guiding him. The two hesitated.

"I won't ask again."

"Fine." Collin said, stepping on his brother's foot when he was about to protest. Without another word, he dragged Dennis out behind him, the slamming the hotel door behind him.

"We can't leave Hermione…" Dennis looked at his brother, at a loss for what had gotten into him.

"Of course we can't!" Dennis exclaimed, "We'll come back for her...we just need to get help."

It took more convincing than Collin would have liked, but he finally persuaded Dennis to stay behind, hidden at a different hotel. Alone, Collin could travel a certain distance by foot, and then apparate to Weasley Wizards Wheezes. With his disguise still intact, no trace to worry about, and his faith in the Weasley twins, he was sure they would be able to rescue Hermione from Malfoy.

* * *

Lucius paced at the foot of the bed, struck with an even madder idea than the one that brought him here. It had the potential to backfire stupendously, in ways he couldn't even begin to think up. He didn't think it would, though. The alternative, to imperio a healer at Saint Mungos, was worse.

Bracing himself, he disaparated from the hotel room.

The setting he found himself in was awful. Areas of the grounds were burned, and nearly everywhere else weeds sprouted up from two decades of neglect, overtaking the once well manicured gardens. He stared at the large manor house in the distance, surprised that an entire wing of it hadn't crumbled onto its sole inhabitant.

It was in shambles from the fight that took place there at the end of the first war, when Aurors stormed the place to capture Rabastan, Antonin, Evan, Rodolphus, and Bellatrix. The battle that took place was legendary, claiming Evan's life, along with Mad-Eye's last bit of sanity. It ended with the capture and subsequent imprisonment of his friends.

Their stint of revenge against the Longbottoms cost them everything, and he spent years wondering over their stupidity. Rabastan could have otherwise continued his unremarkable career as a healer, Antonin could have fled the country, and Evan married his awful fiancee and had years to repent the decision. Of course, Bella and Rodolphus were too well known to disappear for long, but there was never any doubt that _they_ would be trying to take their revenge after the fall of their master, preferring Azkaban to a world run by blood-traitors.

After a minute of walking down the unkempt gravel path, he paused to cast a numbing spell on his leg, hoping to ease the pain for the remainder of his walk up. He stopped breathing when he heard a cracking noise, only meters behind him.

"What are you doing here?" Rabastan asked.

"It's a pleasure to see you alive as well." Lucius said, turning and pointing his wand towards the man.

"You know how dangerous it is for you to show up here." said Rabastan.

"You owe me, _friend_."

"Do I?" the darker man seethed, pulling out his own wand in return.

"I need you to heal someone. Then I'll consider you no longer in my debt." Lucius responded, "Twenty two years I've kept your secret. This is the _very_ _least_ you can do for me."


	11. Recovery

**Thank you so much for your reviews/favourites/follows (...and for reading)!**

 **I know it's been a little while since I updated, but here's the next chapter...not quite where I'd planned on ending it, but I'm struggling a bit (to be read as a lot) with the more...ahem...explicit scene that's supposed to follow.**

 **If anyone is interested in beta reading this story PLEASE pm me! I would love not to cringe every time I post a chapter, wondering what grammatical atrocity I've committed and what new plot hole I'll notice the next day.**

"I disagree." Rabastan spat out, "you're a dead man, Lucius. If I killed you and dumped your body in front of the Dark Lord I would be rewarded, and my _secret_ would die with you. There's nothing to prevent me."

Lucius didn't move his wand from where he held it, menacingly pointed towards Rabastan. He knew what was preventing Rabastan from casting the first curse was _only_ knowing he wouldn't win the subsequent duel. They'd been evenly matched in their youth, but a decade and a half in Azkaban hadn't served his friend well. He hadn't expected anything more than this as a welcome, but he was starting to doubt his ability to sway the other Death Eater.

"You'll never see her again if you kill me," Lucius said, a cruel smirk on his lips, feigning confidence, "you'll never even know who she is, or where I hid her."

"I already thought you were dead, I've come to terms with it."

"Please...what would it take, Rabastan?" His facade was breaking, the desperate, exhausted man underneath taking over his demeanour. Hermione was dying, and he wasn't able to do anything for her. His Hermione. The last couple days had been harder on him than than any number of months before.

"Beg me." the man snarled, "Beg me to save whoever needs to be saved. Tell me, _traitor,_ that you will find yourself in my debt. That twenty two years from now, after years of threats and years of leveraging you over a _name_ , I can call in on a favour of my own."

"Please...I _am_ begging you, Rabastan. Help me." his voice caught in his throat.

The man looked him over, disgusted. "This is what Lucius Malfoy has been reduced to?" he said, "I hope you'll both rot in hell before this is all over."

"Thank you," Lucius breathed out, ignoring the growing repulsion Rabastan seemed to feel for his presence.

"Apparate us there, Lucius."

When they arrived in the hotel room, Rabastan's eyes fell to the girl on the bed within moments. He didn't bother accosting Lucius with questions about why they were in a muggle room, he would wonder about it later and live perfectly content without the knowledge. It was bad enough that he knew the man was alive, and that he was helping him...it was a death sentence, sure as day. Lucius knew that, he knew that Rabastan would be in even more danger than the standard Death Eater, but he didn't care. Apparently he'd sacrifice his oldest friend for his purpose, whatever that happened to be.

He moved to her side, refraining from a comment about how young the girl was, and instead set about casting diagnostic spells over her sleeping body. He cursed under his breath, a tirade of curses, really, and set to work. There was so much to fix, starting with internal damage from apparition while severely injured, what appeared to be a poor reaction to a mixture of potions, and the remnants of a dark spell, wrecking no small amount of havoc on her organs.

Lucius sat, immobile, on a chair in the corner of the room, gripping his wand. Some amount of trust needed to be placed in the healer, but only the absolute minimum. Following a recent trend, he felt helpless as he watched. So much was out of his control, so much was deeply out of his area of expertise.

The sun shone, angry into their eyes by the time Rabastan began to conclude his work. It was setting in a pink, orange, and red sky, but unlike the times Lucius watched it with Hermione, huddled by the fire, there was no comfort to be drawn. He still didn't know if she would live, he didn't know anything, because Rabastan hadn't seen fit to speak a single word to him since their arrival.

The angry, swollen red cuts spelled out the word 'mudblood' on her arm and made his stomach turn. While the shallow cuts were the least of her injuries, the ugly marks and ugly word were difficult to look at.

Slumping against the back of the chair he'd pulled by her side, Rabastan looked at Lucius, and broke the silence, "She'll live...wake up properly in a few hours. I've gotten rid of every last trace of the curse, but it will take another week to heal. She can move around fine, but no apparition. Don't risk any of the potions."

Rabastan's eyes fell to that same ugly mark Lucius had spent most of the day staring at. He looked over to Lucius a moment, then back to the girl, and raised his wand over her arm to cast one last spell.

Lucius expected it to go away, to knit itself back together, but it didn't. Instead, it stared back at him, red and ugly as ever.

Rabastan stood, a gesture imitated by Lucius, albeit in a less graceful way. Smirking, and wearing a look that promised nothing good, the darker man walked towards his old friend, pointing his wand at his chest.

"That wound will never heal, not fully. It will brand her for what she is, and it's my most sincere hope that every time you fuck your mudblood child, you remember exactly what that makes you, _Blood-Traitor_."

He'd succeeded in unsettling Lucius, Rabastan thought, with some triumph.

"You're hardly standing on the moral high ground." Lucius hissed, glaring back.

"Is that still how you see it? A moral high ground?"

Lucius made no answer, simply stared back at him with a frown.

"I don't know how you live with yourself." Rabastan's parting words of genuine speculation hung in the silence, even after he'd disapparated.

Hermione would live, he chanted to himself, trying to push aside how deeply perturbed he was left feeling by his interaction with Rabastan.

Lucius moved towards her, tucking her arm under the blanket and carefully brushing out the wrinkles, then walked around to sit on the empty side of the bed.

* * *

When Hermione woke up, the room was dark save for the city lights leaking in through the window. She remembered the past days like a dream, hazy and disjointed, but now everything seemed to have regained its usual sharpness. She pulled herself up into a seated position, relieved not to feel pain any longer.

It was strange to feel well again, enjoying all the overlooked benefits of health. Something tugged at her memory, there was another person here earlier today. A person she didn't know, that must have been who healed her...but who were they? She would have to ask Lucius. How had he been able to find someone to heal her? Catching sight of her arm, she swallowed hard. Someone to heal _some_ of her, she corrected.

That word, why was that word still on her? She shuddered, maybe it hadn't been worth the effort in comparison to everything else. She would heal it herself, she decided. Having no idea where her wand was, Hermione reached across Lucius for his, on the bedside table, careful not to wake him. She paused for a moment, mid reach, her eyes taking him in again. She pressed a kiss on his hair, lingering still a moment longer than she should, drawing her hand back for a moment to tuck his hair out of his face. Hardly looking away from him, she shifted her weight again to reach for the wand.

" _Vulnera Sanentur,"_ she sang quietly, expecting the cuts to shrink into nothing. She felt the spell sink into her arm, and begin to do its work. "Ahh!"

She let out a cry, dropping the wand, and covering the wounds with her right hand. Hermione was horrified when the cuts began to bleed, losing any of the progress it had made healing since they'd escaped the snatchers.

"Hermione?" Lucius asked, shifting on the bed, his voice filled with urgent concern.

She watched his eyes fall to her arm and her hand, which was once again covered in blood.

"Tergeo" Lucius muttered, and her arm cleaned itself up, although the cuts still kept bleeding.

"I tried to heal it and it got worse…" she said, looking up at him.

She saw guilt in his features, guilt and shame, and wondered where those came from. What had he done, she pondered, to inspire that? His jaw clenched, and he said nothing. She waited for him to pull her to his side, for his hand to reach out for her, or even for him to shuffle closer. He did none of those things, he just kept staring at her wound.

Why wouldn't he stop staring at it? She transfigured some bandages, pressing them to the wound, awkwardly trying to quell the bleeding the muggle way. He continued to sit in silence, finally looking away and closing his eyes again. _Bloody insufferable man._

"What did you say?" he asked.

"You heard me," she said. Of course she'd said that out loud, she meant to, come to think on it.

"What's wrong?" she finally asked. She could hear the pleading in her voice, and she hated it. She sounded like a child, begging for a kind word or pacifying gesture. "Never mind."

Hermione stood abruptly, leaving the room, her tangle of hair bouncing behind her with each step. Walking over to the couch she'd seen on her way to the bathroom, she continued to press the bandage to the wound, wincing when she realized it was rapidly soaking through. Weary of trying another healing spell after her last result, she transfigured more bandage to cover it with, this time tying it down with a few other strips to free her right hand.

Staring at the door she'd walked through, she wondered if Lucius would follow her, or if he would go back to sleep. Closing her eyes, she remembered the feeling of waking up in his arms, engulfed by his warmth. It was cold here, alone. Something insisted she push aside her pride and go back to him, but she didn't, just continued to torture herself with a mess of memories, good and bad.

She was nearly asleep by the time he did emerge, and her eyes snapped open to meet his. She didn't say anything, her knees tucked up near her chest and her arms close by, cocooning herself to keep as much warmth as she could.

"Come to bed, it's late," he sighed, leaning against the door frame.

"No." she said, wondering, again, why she was being stubborn and denying herself a warm bed. It wasn't like he'd done anything to make her angry, except be horribly unhelpful.

She saw him slit the woman's throat, tossing her out of the way like she was worth nothing.

He looked at her, frowning when she didn't move.

The flash of green light that killed the other ones, in both their encounters with snatchers. He was a murderer. She felt sick each time she recalled that fact, but it couldn't be forgotten.

Lucius just kept staring, waiting.

The blood soaking the snatcher's chest moments after her own spell landed. Sectumsempra. She couldn't forget that, either.

"Rabastan healed you." he said, "then the bastard cursed you...that's why the cuts on your arm won't heal."

"Rabastan _Lestrange_?" Hermione hissed, pulling herself out of her balled up position on the couch, anger filling the void and digging itself in her soul. Everything else was pushed aside, as she pictured Alice and Frank Longbottom in St Mungos, and the wanted posters that lined Diagon Alley after both mass Azkaban break outs. Springing to her feet, she continued "He's a Death Eater!"

"Of course he is. What would you have had me do? Walk into St Mungos with you? Imperius one of their healers? You were going to die."

"Rabastan _fucking_ Lestrange!" she shouted, "what were you thinking?"

He opened his mouth, but she cut him off, "He could have killed me! He could have killed us _both_ , or did you forget you aren't a Death Eater anymore!" she paused for a breath, then continued before he could collect himself, "What were you thinking?" she asked again.

"I wasn't!" he hissed back, silencing her, "I wasn't thinking. _You were going to die_."

Her mouth snapped shut, effectively cutting off whatever she was going to yell next when the meaning of his words sunk in. He'd faced Rabastan fucking Lestrange for her. She dropped her shoulders, feeling the last of the fight leave her, and watched his chest rise and fall. Everything hit her then, his pained expression, the defensive stance he'd taken sometime since she started yelling, the concern and care that were etched in his face. That he would do anything for her, kill for her and die for her, might as well be stamped across his forehead. It was the first time she noticed that.

She walked towards the door, and he seemed relieved she'd let go of the notion to sleep on the couch for the night. When he turned to lead into the room, Hermione reached out, catching his arm in her hand, bringing the other one to help tug him back towards her. Dreading a renewed argument, Lucius turned towards her and opened his mouth to tell her to save it for the next day, beg her to. He could feel his head pounding and his eyes closing even while standing upright. He never had time to complete the thought.

The second he was facing her, she dropped his arm, taking his face between her hands. Somewhat awkwardly with their height difference, she managed to tip toe and pull him close enough to press her lips against his. They were warm and soft, but when they didn't press back against hers, she wondered if she'd made a mistake and could feel the blush creeping up her face.

Rocking her weight back onto her heels, she pulled her hands off of him and took a step back. He looked at her, a frown marring his face. She blushed even harder, looking for something to say, wracking her brain for anything to help dispel her humiliation at the unspoken rejection. Preoccupied as she was, she still didn't miss when his eyes flickered to her left arm, where her cuts were covered by transfigured bandages.

The embarrassment of rejection she could live with, but as she thought of what _that_ might mean tears came unbidden to her eyes. She turned and took another step back, moving towards the safety of the couch, hating herself for acting impulsively. When had that ever worked out well for her, she wondered.

It was his turn to catch her arm, he held it loosely, as though entirely unsure of his hand's welcome against her skin. It tightened fractionally when she halted her steps, but fell away when she turned and hovered over her shoulder.

Hermione wondered if it was self respect she was lacking, when she moved back into him, suspecting what she did. Even while she hated herself for it, she craved to feel more of him against her. When his lips lowered to her forehead, her cheek, her neck, she closed her eyes and moved still closer, crushing her body against his, lost to everything but the mingled triumph and lust. Her head moved to allow him better access while he trailed kisses along the length of neck, her hands gripping him.

When his mouth found hers, she couldn't have been more eager to return his kiss. His one hand tightened around her waist while the other sprawled against her back; her own hold on his hips tightened, her fingers digging into the fabric covering them, terrified, just as he was, that if she let go, even just for a moment, she would lose him.

She could feel his heart racing, pounding and for a moment they pulled apart, warm breath continuing to mingle as their eyes met. He touched her face, and she couldn't help but wonder at the fleeting glimpse of pain she saw.

"Let's go to bed," Lucius said. He grinned at her expression, and she could only wonder what showed on her face, "To sleep." he clarified, dropping his hand and squeezing her shoulder, stepping back and put a respectable amount of space between themselves. It was as though they'd exchanged nothing more than a generic conversation, or maybe a heated word or two.

" _Right_ ," she said, looking up skeptically, her eyes dropping for a moment to where his trousers bulged before meeting his eyes again, a wicked smile creeping onto her face even as she blushed crimson.


	12. Finally Together

**Thank you so very much to every one who has added this story to their follows and favourites, as well as left a review!**

 **I'm not sure how this chapter turned out...it's definitely not what I'd originally intended. I rewrote it a few times, and finally decided to post it before I changed my mind again. Please leave a review! I would love feedback...this is the first time I've tried writing anything even remotely sexual and advice for the future would be very welcome!**

Sitting on the side of the bed, Hermione felt horribly self-conscious, her mind racing to think through every movement she made and how it would be interpreted. A particularly difficult task when she, herself, was unsure how she wanted them to be taken. Part of her wanted to be bold and confident, to be sure of herself and communicate what she wanted like the adult she was, but there was so much vulnerability in doing that. The proverbial ball would be entirely in his court, she would be renouncing control on how they moved forward, waiting on his response.

It scared her; he had so much power to hurt her. She tugged at the zipper on her sweater, peeling off the layer and grasping at the hem of her shirt, debating whether to go ahead and pull it off over her head, exposing herself in so many ways she hadn't before.

To sleep, he said. She felt like she was making a fool of herself even considering what she was. Thinking of the way his tongue traced her lips and his hands clutched her against his body, Hermione worked to push away her concerns.

Her eyes found Lucius, sitting at the end of the bed. Facing the wall, she couldn't see his face, just the way his fist balled, knuckles white, while he gripped the blanket. Swinging her feet onto the bed, she put her internal debate on pause and crawled across the space between them, sitting herself behind him.

He flinched when she put her hands on his shoulders, and she almost pulled away. For a moment, her hands ghosted over the sleeve, and when he didn't make any more effort to leave, they squeezed. A comforting gesture, that quickly devolved into something else when she trailed a hand through his hair, feeling the contrast with her curls as her fingers slipped through it without resistance. If either of them noticed the way her hands shook, or her voice wavered, neither of them acknowledged it.

"I want your hair," she said, feeling the need to fill the silence with something, even if it was drivel, "I've always wanted your hair. The first time I saw you, I didn't think it was fair for such an awful person to have such pretty hair."

Stop talking, she ordered herself, snapping her mouth shut while what little blood hadn't rushed to her face already promptly did so. A person hardly wanted to hear from their...sexual interest...that they were an awful person. From anyone, really, although she _hoped_ that he could consider her a sexual interest.

Remembering how it felt looking at boys even a few years younger than herself didn't leave her much hope; she felt revolted at the very notion of seeing them in a non-platonic way. They were children, their faces not even fully matured...the thought of being intimate...did Lucius look at her and think the same? She was the same age as his son, not even a full year older. When he was her age, she wasn't even a possibility, her parents had neither met nor began to see each other.

Had he picked this as a sticking point, a time to suddenly discover his scruples? Was making love to a girl young enough to be his daughter where he drew the arbitrary line in the sand? Or, when he looked at her, did he see a clumsy, inexperienced child. One whose malnutrition had done nothing to emphasize the curves of her body, and whose hair barely looked presentable with potions and proper cleaning products at her disposal. She hadn't even thought to cut it since she'd been in hiding, and the extra length hardly improved its manageability. Grow it out, she remembered her aunt telling her, the extra weight will help tame the curls. If she ever saw the woman, she would tell her just what she thought of her advice.

Her eyes fell to the bare skin at the nape of his neck. Only a few minutes before, his lips had been on her, his tongue tasting and teasing, and she cursed the awkwardness that settled between them. It hadn't felt like he had any scruples, and he'd certainly seemed to find her desirable enough. Torn between the urge to run away and to press her lips to that spot she couldn't look away from, she finally chose the more pleasant option, hoping beyond everything else that he wasn't just using her to satisfy a need.

She felt him inhale, then exhale, finally letting go of his death grip on the bed. He moved to stand, turning, while her heart continued to pound in her chest. It was loud enough to wonder if even at the distance he stood, he might hear it. Lucius looked at her, meeting her eyes, trying to decide something. She felt herself shrink under his gaze, swallowing hard as she waited for him to react. Unable to help herself, she lifted a hand to his chest, trailing it down over his stomach and pushing under his shirt. She couldn't have conceived a more awkward gesture if she tried, considering the way his eyes followed her hand's movement, continuing to assess something she was not privy to.

When he leaned in to kiss her again, the uncertainty filling the room only moments before dissolved. Wrapping his arms under her shoulder, he hoisted her up to the middle of the bed, crawling over her to cover her body with his. He couldn't touch her enough, taste her enough, and neither could she. Relief, then triumph, flooded her senses, along with every other wonderful sensation he was eliciting from her.

Her shirt was no longer a dilemma, pulled off before she could even begin to reconsider. Her trousers followed, bra and underwear lasting only a few moments longer as his hands impatiently explored every inch of her body. Still dressed, he hovered over her, taking in her every curve, her chest rising and falling with her laboured breath, her stomach, and lower still, where her legs twisted in an attempt to hide herself from him.

He smiled at her, a genuine smile that held neither malice nor condescension, and while it quickly turned into a smug smirk. She held onto that small reassurance which he'd provided as he pushed open her legs, letting his eyes rake over her.

He trailed a hand down her body, more slowly now, cupping her breasts. His thumb brushed across her nipple, already hard from the cold air that caused the curtains to bulge and flap, although blessedly continuing to maintain their privacy.

Her back arched, and she ached for him to go still further down, where her body pulsed and ached for him. Tugging at his shirt, she ended his scrutiny with another kiss, and when she pulled at his clothes again, he frowned in frustration at their refusal to cooperate. There was only a momentary brush of shame at his eagerness to comply with her unspoken request. He heard Rabastan's mocking voice when he felt the bandage on her arm brush against him. Letting himself press his weight into her, he buried his face in her hair where her own scent mingled with the hotel shampoo.

He felt the way she stiffened under him, her breathing changing as she struggled to control the panic starting to grip her. A new swell of hatred for the snatcher flared up, and he regretted contemplating, even for a moment, letting her live. He hoped she'd known exactly what was happening while she bled out, and that it hadn't been a painless experience. He kissed Hermione's neck, his hand snaking between the bed and her back. Still trapping her against his body, he rolled her above him, and the effect was obvious. Her shoulders visibly relaxed, and the fear that had momentarily crossed her features was gone.

Her breathing was erratic for entirely different reasons than earlier. He should stop, tell the girl to go to sleep, and hope she still deluded herself into thinking this was a good idea in the sobering light of the morning sun. He did back down, but his hands continued, of their own accord, their exploration.

"Touch me," he wanted to beg, but he didn't speak. Instead, Lucius continued to hold the weight of her breast in his hand, pinching her nipple and eliciting a throaty gasp, while his other hand gripped her hip, moving her against him.

Her skin felt heavenly, nipple pressing against his palm. After a few more moments, sensing the girl had calmed herself, he pushed her back down on the bed, taking care not to trap her this time. It was a slow torture that his cock protested, as he trailed his mouth along her body, begging himself to be patient.

For a moment, she'd gone numb to Lucius's attentions. Tensing in response to the way her body had been restrained, pinned down beneath his own, glimpsing the mark on his arm, her nightmares surfaced and the moment firmly at an end. When he moved her out from under him, she was left with a crushing disappointment as her body remembered again how much she wanted this man, and her brain rationalized that he wasn't her nightmare he was Lucius, who'd helped her get through her nightmares for months.

His hand found its way between her legs, and she let out another soft gasp as his fingers began to move against her in the sweetest massage, the most intimate caress. She leaned towards him, pressing her body against his, wanting to feel as much of his skin as she could. Her breasts pressed into his chest and his hand slipped out, leaving a wet trail as he found a new angle to approach.

His cock was hard and warm between them, pressed against her hip and his body at her side. She was going mad, his fingers still sending a tingling feeling throughout her entire body, all pulsing from the single point of contact that she could focus on. They felt heavenly, but her body wanted so much more to be satisfied.

His lips moved from hers, closing in around her nipple. A bolder version of herself would have demanded he fuck her then, that he sheath himself with her and pound into her, but she just waited, her hands twitching towards his erect member. Prevented from touching it by some invisible force that seemed at war with her common sense.

"Lucius…" she mumbled between kisses, willing him to somehow understand what she wanted. He paused, apparently receiving her unspoken request.

When he pulled away from her, she felt the loss of mouth, his body, and his warmth acutely, but his hands never left her. Tugging at her hips, she let him guide her, unsure what he wanted. Her eyes fell back to his cock, a surge of nerves crossed her mind at the thought of her body needing to accommodate it somehow even while her body sung that its release was approaching.

She tried to twist her head to look at him when he turned her away, on her arms and knees, but his hand gripped into her hair prevented her from continuing. Her heart pounded and her breathing quickened at the act's loss of intimacy.

Her fears returned tenfold. Was he thinking of his wife, or of some beautiful woman he'd known before the war, pretending it wasn't the mudblood child he'd been forced to coexist with for the last year.

Her heart pounded, and she winced when he finally pushed himself into her.

The pleasure her body yearned to feel was notably absent and a painful ache filled its absence. She was thankful he didn't begin to move for a moment, and her body slowly adjusted to the intrusion. When he did start to thrust into her, she could concentrate on the reassuring movement of his hand against her thigh and the smell of the musty hotel bed. Through the pain and her search for pleasure somewhere behind it, desperate for what was between her and Lucius to be good, she could only feel an overwhelming sense of failure.

Earlier she'd seized up, and now it seemed she was doing no better, clutching at the bed in an effort to stifle the pained noise threatening to pull itself from her throat. She couldn't anymore. He thrust hard into her and her struggle to keep silent was lost. He stilled, and for an unending moment the silence hung thick between them. She felt him pull away from her, and waited for some sort of confusion at her inability to go through with what she'd desperately wanted only minutes before. She didn't move, fighting back yet another flush of humiliation right along with the used feeling forming at the pit of her stomach.

The final failure in a year of failure. Ron walked out, Harry was missing, her Horcrux list no longer than when she'd started, while the death count continued to steadily rise. She was unable to defend her friends, and now even...unable to perform adequately.

His hands trailed on her back, just as softly caressing as they'd been earlier, and she let her knees slide out so she was laying on her stomach. Still refusing to turn and unable to face Lucius, she tried to fight the stinging tears in her eyes.

She felt him lie back onto the bed, and the mattress dip next to her. Rather than continue to trace patterns on her back, his hands gathered her and drew her to his chest.

"I'm sorry, Hermione." he mumbled into her hair, "I'm so very sorry, my love."

Suddenly, it didn't matter that her first time having sex was single handedly the largest let-down she'd experienced. That twisting, gnawing feeling of being used was gone, and in its place the warmth and comfort of being loved. It was easier for her rational mind to remind herself of what she'd known, felt in her very soul, earlier that evening before insecurity took over, when he held her like she was everything.


	13. Turning Points

Hermione laid on the lumpy mattress wrapped in Lucius's arms faking sleep. She meant to be sleeping, really, but with the way her head was spinning out of control she had no idea how that could be attempted. What had just happened? They'd had sex. Tried to have sex, more like. Shame. Triumph. Fear. Love. Anticipation. Disappointment.

When it seemed like her emotions were going to overwhelm her, she was suddenly distracted by the fact that she was still ensconced in his arms, buried in his warmth. She could feel his uneven breath on her neck, his skin against hers, and his hands...the way his thumb rubbed against her collarbone, fingers tangled in the necklace he made her. She heard him swallow hard, tightening his grip around her.

"Lucius?" she asked, her voice tentative, in the off chance he was asleep.

"Yes?" he responded. Despite her hair muffling his voice, he sounded no closer to that elusive state than she was.

The glaring red numbers staring at her from the bedside changed again, 12:03 turning to 12:04. He shifted, moving behind her to plant a kiss on her naked shoulder, which poked out from under the covers. His hands stayed firm, keeping her tightly pressed against him while his thumb continued to stroke.

She didn't know what she wanted to say, opening her mouth for a second before closing it.

"What is it?" he asked. If she didn't know better, she would think he sounded afraid. He couldn't be though, it was silly to imagine. Her analytical, logical self would have liked to knock into her what outsiders would say was common sense, but it didn't hold enough power just then.

When she didn't answer, Lucius could feel himself becoming more uncomfortable. Waiting for her to push him away, he breathed in the smell of her hair and memorized the feel of her body. He'd disappointed the girl, he felt it, and he'd hurt her.

To sleep, he'd said, and meant it. As unappealing as the notion was, as tempting as he'd found the alternative, there had been no doubt in his mind when he'd said it that it was the better course of action. They were exhausted, his head hurt, and she was barely recovered from her injuries. Emotions were running high and judgement, for both of them, was severely impaired. For a man in his forties, he'd behaved alarmingly like a fifth year boy, excited to get his first shag and damn the consequences.

"Nothing," she mumbled, twisting her body to move closer to him still, "just…"

Lucius wasn't typically the one to feel the need to fill the silence. Whether comfortable or not. Enough of his life had been filled with both to cause him to make his peace with the notion, but exhaustion lowered his inhibitions.

"Hermione," he said, lifting a hand to brush her hair behind her ears, "you're beautiful, you know." Not in the conventional way. Aesthetically, Lucius could hardly deceive himself that she was the picture of proper proportions and symmetry.

People hadn't lied when they told her that her hair was horrible, and that her face was average. He wouldn't have looked twice at her if he'd passed her in the street, or seen her at a social event, no matter how well dressed she was. Now that he knew her though, he didn't know how he could look away. Her beauty was in the way she smiled and laughed, the way her eyes lit up when she was teasing, or the triumph that spread across her face every time she caught on to something new. It was in her bizarre, unyielding belief in right and wrong, and the way she fought back _hard_ if pushed. It was the sort of beauty that couldn't fade, even when she was half starved on the run. The kind that wouldn't fade when she aged, even the day her horrible frizzy hair turned gray, and her skin wrinkled.

"I'm sorry I didn't make you feel like you were. I'm sorry I hurt you...that it was," he flinched, "bad."

Hermione's eyelids felt heavy over her eyes. His words felt like a blanket covering her, lulling her into peace and sleep.

"I don't want to let you go." he said, "but I'm afraid you'll ask me to."

In her sleepy daze, Hermione turned towards his and planted a light kiss in the vicinity of his mouth. "I think I'd rather you keep holding me."

"Goodnight," she added, a small content smile playing on her lips, feeling more sated than if their earlier endeavour had been successful.

She closed her eyes again, snuggling into him, letting her head rest on his shoulder.

* * *

 _ **October 23, 1998**_

Theo didn't think his boss at the ministry fully understood how low he and Thorfinn sat in the Death Eater hierarchy. Like...how they were rock bottom. They literally, probably, were worth less to the Dark Lord than some valuable stones at Malfoy Manor. Of course, he wasn't about to disabuse the man of the notion that his favour was something worth garnering.

"Sir, we're very flattered that you graced our humble halls with your presence." the man simpered.

Theo coughed, hiding a laugh as he shared a look with Thorfinn… the ministry worker was really, really bloody far gone.

It was one of their monthly check ins, where they submitted something that shared a few key characteristics with 'paperwork', but was such a shoddy mess that Theo still cringed when he handed it in. It was all going to be rewritten anyways, he told himself, to fit with whatever agenda the department head was trying to push.

"Mr. Nott," a voice drawled from behind him, and seeing the man in front of him rearrange himself, Theo begin to have second thoughts about his earlier assessment. Headmaster Severus Snape's presence in the ministry looked like it would cause the man to fall into a dead faint at any moment. "Ministry cases have been keeping you busy?"

It wasn't like Snape to make small talk, nor was it like him to be at the ministry. Theo didn't like when people deviated from their patterns, it didn't typically mean anything good for him. Swallowing hard, he continued to fix his eyes on a far point of the hallway, refusing to meet Snape's; he wasn't going to make that mistake a second time.

"I suppose," he answered through clenched teeth. A glance to Thorfinn let him know that he, too, was terrified. He regretted having told him as much as he had, he'd put his friend in danger. He didn't have enough of those at the moment to treat them like they were expendable.

"Well, I'm afraid it will have to wait. I have my own assignment for you and Mr. Rowle. I expect you won't mind if I borrow your drones?" he asked the ministry worker, who shook his head violently, beseeching Snape to take them.

"What is the assignment, Sir?" Thorfinn asked, like a good soldier, squaring his shoulders and standing a little more upright. Theo just glared harder at the spot on the wall.

Snape didn't bother to conceal an eyeroll. "I will meet you in...say an hour...at Nott Manor."

Without waiting longer, he turned on his heels and walked away, cloak billowing behind him.

He wondered what Snape wanted.

The reluctant headmaster walked away, wondering if he was doing the right thing by placing a trail on Andromeda. The woman was friends with Lucius once upon a time, and it didn't seem unreasonable that, after exhausting every other option, he would turn to her for help. It was unlikely, but the Dark Lord would be pacified to see him do _something_. He hated every task that dug him further into the Death Eater trenches. The war was supposed to be over by now, but here he was hunting down his former patron on his master's orders, which he still obeyed on Dumbledore's. Merlin he was exhausted.

The young Death Eaters' blatant, deliberate negligence, he hoped, would be enough to keep them from finding anyone in the Order. Not that it was likely her home was still used in any capacity. He found himself questioning Dumbledore's orders yet again, unsure what kept him loyal to the dead man. Even if it was a fairly low risk action, like just about everything he did these days, it didn't sit right with him.

Perhaps he would follow Lucius's footsteps and disappear. There was no family or loved ones keeping him where he was. He closed his eyes for a moment, remembering the students. There was a death the year before, despite his best efforts to mitigate the Carrow's damage. The little girl was just barely twelve, a half blood hufflepuff who'd spoken in defense of her muggle mother in muggle studies, and had looked so broken in death. It was no longer only Lily's face that haunted him, reminding him why he fought this war as long as he did, it was hers, Charity's, and many others. Each one felt like a personal failure.

Snape didn't want to think what would happen with the Carrows going unchecked. His responsibilities wouldn't run away on their own, abandoning him for dead the way Lucius's had. He still had a purpose to serve, damn Dumbledore and his twinkling eyes.

* * *

Andromeda drummed her fingers against the table, staring out through the window at the field behind her home.

"Mum?" a voice asked, nearly drowned out by a crying child.

She heard neither her daughter, nor her grandson, with her expression still glazed over as she watched a point far in the horizon. She expected Ted to come back home any minute now. He said he would be home for supper, and he she could always count on him being there when he said he would be. He was reliable, her Teddy.

"Mummy…" Dora said again, reaching out to touch her mother's shoulder. "Dad's not gonna be home."

"You'll see Dora, he'll be home. Daddy promised he would be."

Dora started crying, while her son only wailed louder in chorus with her. Andromeda finally tore her eyes from the window, and looked at her daughter with concern. "What's wrong, child?"

"He's not coming home, Mum!" she cried out, "He's been gone over a year. You sit here… expecting Dad will just show up every day, but he's" she choked, "he's not coming home."

"Your father would never lie to me." she said, a sad smile on her face, the kind that sympathetically said she knew better, "he said he would be home for supper. He'll be here tonight, you'll see."

Nymphadora Tonks covered her mouth with the hand that wasn't securing her child to her side, stifling another sob, while gently rocking trying to calm her baby. "This isn't healthy, Mum. Dad's...no one has seen him."

"I would know if he was gone." her mother said, looking at her daughter squarely. It was the first time she'd even acknowledged the possibility, although that didn't make Nymphadora feel any better. "He's my very soul, I would know."

Her own eyes sparkled, filling with unshed tears. Nymphadora wrapped her free arm around her mother's shoulders, trying to manage something that resembled strength, biting down on her lip to keep it from trembling while she comforted her. A year of uncertainty, of having no idea if her father was safe, or even alive, while her own husband was on the run and she was in hiding in her childhood home with a baby.

She saw someone in the distance, through the same window her mother had been looking through, struggling to breach the wards. With a frown on her face, one that looked out of place even if she'd grown more accustomed to the expression recently, she nudged her mother towards the shape.

"Go...hide yourself and little Teddy. I'll see who it is."

Nymphadora's heart raced the way it always did when the cottage had a visitor, not out of fear for herself so much as her child. Her baby boy, defenceless and innocent and damned by the ministry for having a werewolf father. Trudging up the stairs, she didn't think she'd ever felt this exhausted, like the fight had been beaten out of her from months of doing nothing. A fresh wave of anger bubbled up from the pit of her stomach; at Remus for leaving her behind, and at herself for letting him.

 **Thank you for all the lovely reviews on the last chapter! I was wonderful to see so much of a response to it, especially since I was so nervous about posting the thing.**

 **I'm afraid I've been super swamped with life, and haven't had time to write much. I feel like I'm trudging through this and the upcoming part of the story, and I'm so sorry if it shows in what comes out! It's part of the reason this chapter is so short.**

 **I still need a beta reader! It would be really nice to have someone to bounce ideas off of and give feedback on the story before posting it! If you're interested, please send me a pm.**


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